The Mischief Managers
by notsosolemnly
Summary: Following a potions mishap the map enthusiasts gain some unusual abilities and decide to form their own band of Superheroes!
1. Chapter 1

(A/N: I was going to post this for Halloween last year, but didn't finish on time.

For added fun, why not try a drinking game? Take a sip of whatever you got everytime you see the word bubble gum.)

The Mischief Managers

Chapter 1: The Super Bubble Gum.

Pink bubbles expanded until they burst like pimples within cast iron walls. The entire potion filled laboratory B with the sort of sugary sweet fragrance that came a little close to crossing into nauseating penicillin territory, depending on whom you asked. Dying torch flames flickered. Spiders kept dropping into cauldrons that had been left to cook over night, because the pest control refused to lose more lives.

Clothed in a white lab coat and protective goggles, Remus fished out a black widow spider with a steel poaching ladle and dropped it in the sink. Yes, it made him a hypocrite but he couldn't care less right now, when he was trying to up his potions average. A potions average of a measly 7 points was just too humiliating for words, he was the laughing stock in the book club because of it. And in over a year he'd take his OWL's so he needed to work at improving now.

But he so didn't like potions class. He just couldn't stand cooking anything that contained eye of newt, even if they were free range eyes. For so long he had thought he'd just have to live with being perpetually mediocre, until he had come across a book called Veganify, which so far actually lived up to its promise of providing ethical alternatives to common ingredients. And it was thanks to this book that he could not only improve his marks, but also brew the product of his dreams: the Super Bubble Gum. This super bubble gum wasn't going to be like the ordinary mass produced bubble gums. This bubble gum wouldn't break under his teeth, it would expand infinitely and not burst from the tiniest little puff.

The potion had only cooked for one hour and would very likely require many, many more. But being a little impatient tonight, Remus could not resist for the twelfth time in ten minutes picking up the 20 mm sorbet scoop and drop a chunk of potion in a glass of cold water just to check if the consistency had changed at all. But the little unsolid ball fell as flat as ever to the bottom of the glass. It was getting late and the troubleshooting guide had already reliably informed him that it needed more time and so he began to pack up to call it a night, just leaving the potion where it was.

The potion bubbled like an upset stomach, lonely in the fading light with only bats and spiders for company. That was until Snape poked his head through the door to lab A. Now that he knew that he was at last alone in the entire potions dungeon, he snuck up to the unsupervised potion, stuffed a fist of gummy bears in his mouth and watched the pink bubbles erupt.

A notebook that had been foolishly left behind gave him information he could easily have figured out on his own.

"Super Bubble Gum." he snorted. "Let's see what makes this so super. ' _Elastic bands for stretchiness, a slinky for bouncyness, a balloon for air retainment'_..."

Snape had to laugh at the idea that somebody that couldn't even make instant coffee could create a bubble gum with _one_ of these qualities. He tossed away the notes and poured the last of his gummy bears into the potion, thinking that anybody who was so stupid to leave it unsupervised deserved to have it destroyed.

"Woopsie!" he said as he watched the gummy bears sink into the thick brew and transform the neon pink to a dull grey.

He dropped the package in the potion as well and returned to his cooking Gullibus potion in laboratory A, now inspired to create his own super gummy bears. Then he became filled with rage when he realised that gummy bears weren't remotely versatile. It just couldn't be denied that, as far as practicality went, gummy bears sucked and bubble gum was awesome and Snape hated that weird freak _so much_ for it! Oh yes, he knew what a weird freak he really was and he would have liked to warn everybody he came across, but until he had solid evidence he couldn't do that. And speculation, no matter how well grounded in logic it was, just didn't qualify as evidence. Thinking of all this, of how awesome bubble gum was, of how such a weird freak was so much more popular than he was and even had his own body guards, just made him so outraged he kicked a rat so hard it died. Then he took that rat and dropped it in the potion as well.


	2. Chapter 2

The Mischief Managers

Chapter 2: To The Super Lair

Hogsmead had caught roller skating fever. Sirius hated to do things that were _too mainstream_ but in his defence, he had rolled before it was cool. He had been roller skating for so long in fact that the wheels began to wear out and creak and this made them come off as old and unfashionable and he was torn between sticking with them, like Brian May stuck to his Red Special, or getting a new pair just because he liked new things more than old things.

But until he could find the time to go and look at roller skates he would just have to fix what he could in the potions lab tonight. The wheels probably needed replacing since the fraying on the plastic surface wasn't easily filed away. But he could still oil the hinges so they wouldn't squeak at the next roller skate cheerleading session and he didn't even need to go out and buy some special wheel ointment at the specialty shop for the potions cupboards carried free alternatives that worked just as well.

The snout of the oilcan clicked against those hard to reach places of the roller skate undersides. Beside him, James was mixing various varnishes together for his Ziggy Stardust and telling Peter to get him things, and to his other side Remus was still skimming through the troubleshooting guide, desperate for answers and solutions to the unwanted grey tone his perpetually runny bubble gum seemed to have taken overnight.

"I still don't understand." he said when he after having skimmed the same pages for the last twenty minutes still was as clueless as ever.

"It really looks like sabotage." said Sirius and poked a dead rat that was floating around in the bubbling grey goo with his ebony, nymph follicle. "Unless you put that there."

"But who and why and that? Why would anybody want to sabotage a bubble gum potion?"

"It could be that somebody wants to sabotage _your_ potion."

Remus seemed to find the idea genuinely shocking. People-pleasing do-gooders tended to find it hard to believe that anybody would want to sabotage their potions, not realising how annoying some people found people-pleasing do-gooders.

" _My_ potion? What have I ever... actively done... Don't answer that."

"Congratulations. Somebody must be jealous of you."

Remus sat down on the lab stool, ever so disenheartened from the brutal defeat and his limp hands resting on the troubleshooting guide in his lap, that had never lived up to its boldly optimistic promise of providing solutions to every potions mystery out there.

Sirius put down the oil can and ran one roller skate at a time across the table, to test it for squeakyness as well as smooth wheel turns.

"Talk to Slughorn maybe he can help." he said.

Remus took this very classical piece of advice and hopped off the lab stool. As soon as he was gone Sirius put down his roller skates and picked up a ladle which he used to search the potion.

"Nice work, Padfoot!" said James and put down his Ziggy Stardust and little varnishing brush to watch Sirius struggle.

"It was an _accident!"_ said Sirius.

"No, you planting those shrooms for 'elastic tripping' was not an accident."

"By accident I mean that it looked fine at the time, like I thought it would, and also it was your idea."

"Oh, so _now_ it's my idea?"

Searching the potion with the ladle, Sirius hoped to find those shrooms so he could fish them out for that could on occasion sort things out. But aside from a dead rat there was nothing else floating around in the potion.

"You're the one who said: 'You know what would be fun? If somebody dropped shrooms in there.' And by 'somebody' you meant me because you always want me to do the dirty work because you're _soooo loyal!_ "

Aside from some spider remnants there was nothing more to fish out and Sirius put down the ladle, disappointed in himself for not planning the spiking better and researching potential risks first. It looked utterly hopeless and beyond fixing and simply starting over would most likely be time better spent.

"What if we just add lots of pink dye?" James suggested, already fetching jugs from the cupboards. "It might just be a coloration issue."  
"I suppose the spores could be messing with the look."

And so the two began to pour jug after jug of pink gel colouring into the potion until it began to shift back into a very shrill and eye burning fuschia. To take down the edge a bit and make it look less ginger sunburn and more soft and pale Sirius added just a touch of magic white, hoping for a happy accident.

"Ok now it looks like pig again." he said and dropped a scoop of potion in a glass of water, but it retained it's shape as poorly as yesterday. "I'm just going to crank up the heat."

When the heat had been cranked up and the potion was splashing at the sides again, Sirius dipped the scoop a second time.

"And now for the taste test." he said and brought it to his lips, blowing out some of the heat.

"Are you sure?" James asked. "A dead rat floated around in that."

"Why then did you think it was a good idea to add lots of pink dye?"

"Bubble gum for the enemy!"

"Chicken." said Sirius and swallowed the scoop, and felt utterly sick from the sweetness. "Woah!"

He was so dizzy he had to hold on to the table. Everything around him looked vibrant and vibrating. The side of his head pounded and his heart palpitated as if he had just had several tablespoons of grounded nutmeg with peanut butter. Hopefully this wouldn't render him blind.  
"What?" said James. "Does your tripping feel elastic?"

"I didn't think that sugar high was a real thing!"

"Your pupils are really dilated."

Sirius could feel the diabetes expand through his body like an internal balloon and lift him off the ground and ping-pong him across the pink walls, all the while pink unicorns formed in the bubble gum ocean on the floor and began to fight with their horns until one stabbed the other in the heart. The loser bled bubble gum and the winner kicked pans and pots all across the lab victoriously whilst crapping bubblegum.

"Cool!" said a pink moose with kaliedoscope glasses and stuck his face in cauldron and began to slurp greedily, while his large head expanded until it was stuck. Panic struck he began to slam his head repeatedly against the walls and tables until the cast iron vessel broke like glass and the moose spiralled from the shards like a slinky.

"What's going on?" asked a frightened little pig in a blonde moptop.

"Try it!" said the moose and wrapped himself around one of the decorative pillars in the lab. "It's the way to be cool. Isn't that right, roller skate poodle head?"

"Ok then." said the pig uncertainly and dipped the sorbet scoop in the shards and had a lick. The tiny measure seemed to have no effect on the pig that was now beginning to shift back into the form of a short and fat ambiguous squib as the more trippy effects began to wear off for Sirius. The cauldron shards put themselves back together and the pink unicorns jumped back where they came from. The vast bubble gum ocean on the floor shrank into a puddle until it became too microscopic to be seen.

Although nothing was pink anymore, everything still had a pink hue, as if Sirius was looking through a pink window. He felt the sort of tranquility only unjustly illegal drugs could provide as he bounced around slowly below the ceiling.

"OoooOOoooOOO!" James moaned as he twirled himself like a candy cane and put himself in a knot.

The only thing that bugged Sirius now was the sweet aftertaste. Being more at peace with the world than he had ever been he began to bounce off the walls some more, accidentally bouncing the door shut just as it opened.

"Oh no what if it's Slughorn!" said Peter and burst. It looked like it would take a while for him to figure out how to inflate himself again.

But it wasn't Slughorn, it was just Remus and he noticed, using superb observational skills, that conditions weren't exactly the way he had left them. For example, the sorbet scoop was to the right of the potion and he was left handed. He looked around.

"I've missed haven't I?"

"It was us, ok?" Sirius confessed, bouncing around him. "We perfected your potion."

"What do you mean?"  
"We dropped shrooms in your potion to make it awesome and we very, very succesful so sorry not sorry."

The feeling of soaring towards the ceiling and using it to launch a pinball effect was better than all the pink unicorns in the world. And he did not suffer any motion sickness, on the contrary; he felt light an airy like an angel food cake.

"I regret nothing!" said James, just bouncing across the floor on elongated corkscrew legs.

To catch a break from the intensive pinballing Sirius had to grab hold of a kitchen rail where wooden spoons and stainless steel whisks hung over portable medium stoves. Remus was looking over his notes and jotting down observations, seemingly still intent on fixing what was already perfect. Sirius soared back to him and dipped the sorbet scoop.

"Ok open up say ahhhhh..."

"I was trying to- _Stop it!_ Blegh!"

Remus had to spit out the little potion he had been forcefed in a measuring cup.

"Why are you objecting this time?"

"I'm _not_ -"

Remus shoved the scoop away from his face and covered his mouth. Since he refused to speak under the threat of having a dose of diabetes shoved in his mouth, Sirius removed the scoop. For _now._

"I was trying to boost my grades" Remus explained behind his hand. "And a super potion is just the sort of thing I for one wouldn't want people to know of."

"You got your whole life to boost your grades."

"No I don't."

"Do you really think you will look back at your life one day and think: 'That time I boosted by potions grades, those were good times.'"

"No. I think I will look back at my life one day and think: That time I made the book club eat my grades, those were good times."  
"They're stupid and boring who cares. I don't know why anybody would want to be able to recite kings and wars and fill your head with useless information you'll just have to delete at some point anyway. It's not how much you know that determines if you're clever, but what you do with what you know..."

"Inspirational stuff Padfoot where did you read that?" James asked.

"In some Warlock Gnomes fanfic. It's the new Shakespeare I tell you."

"That doesn't sound like something Warlock Gnomes would say, 'though."

"'Elementary, my dear Wombat, eating too much peanut butter will make your tears taste like peanut butter' doesn't sound like something he would say either."

"Now you're taking things out of context."

"'The moment I kissed your cheeks, I knew it was you'."  
"Yes, but did you like my Femlock slash?"

"I don't know. It was a lot of fem but not enough lock."

Remus put down his notes. "You're right. Grades aren't important."

"What is your potions average?"

"Uhmmmm... Seven."

 _"Seven?"_

"Yes, seven. It was 8, but then I got 1 on the Roofie Potion and that lowered the entire average."

"The Roofie Potion is really easy as well as vegan. You should have made it and given it to Slughorn."

"Uhm, no."

"I wish I had now, that would have served him right."

"But he might have liked it doesn't he collect little boys?" James asked.

" _Posh_ little boys."

"You know, on second thought," said Remus, "maybe I _will_ do that"

"Yaaaay celebratory super scoop!" said Sirius and gave the sorbet scoop to Remus who would not be fed like a baby the second time around either. Instead he took the scoop in his own hands and swallowed it quick like it was echinacea. His eyes blackened within seconds

"Woah!" he said. "I didn't think that sugar high was a real thing."

"Are you seeing unicorns yet?" Sirius asked.

"What?"

"Nothing"

"What unicorns?"

"What unicorns?"

Remus just stared at him, as if he was a unicorn. Then he began to stroke him on the nose, which was weird. James sneaked out of the lab quietly for a moment to get his camera. Not before long the lab was full of invisible unicorns as well as bunnies and angels by the sound of it. So he was seeing weird things but so far there was no sign of any superpower, unless it was extrasensory of course. Instead of bouncing around he just sat down a giggled, looking fascinated at his surroundings and popping invisible bubble gum.

"The film is probably close to full so I better make it embarassing." said James, having returned unnoticably and began to shoot discretely. But he ran out of film after only four shots, as predicted.

"Oh damn, why did I waste so much film on food art? Talk about waste, photographing pizza pies and croissants and cheese wheels..."

"Don't forget those mooncakes from the Chinese mid autumn festival." Sirius reminded him. "Those were weird, but pretty. "

"I don't know how I managed to eat myself full on those."

"Those moonpies sure were good, 'though."

Suddenly Remus began to emit deafening screams that cut like a knife, uninterruptedly and uncontrollably. Winds of screams sent tables and stools and wizards crashing into cupboards and sinks in a laboratory that was shaking with earthquake proportions.

"Oh shoot the good trip became a bad trip!" said James and wrapped himself around a vibrating pillar while Sirius clung to a lamp that was close to come off with the raining debris.

"Yeah but I love those photos you took of bunnies and homework and Professor McGonagall's comments in the margins."

"That was my favourite too because her 'o's are always slightly oval."

The screams subsided and the hallucinations began to wear off, and furniture stopped breaking down to firewood.

"Oh God I thought it was real!" Remus sighed and was so exhausted he had to lie down on the dusty floor for a minute. His nose twitched. When he tried to get up again he had to use all his strength because apparently his potion-induced power was getting stuck to things. That just couldn't prove to be useful.

"Ok ladies," said James and untwirled himself from the pillar and shook some ceiling debris from his hair, "I guess we have become superheroes at last. I shall from now on be known as captain Stretchmark. And you guys?"

"Pinball Wizard." said Sirius.

"You will be Bouncy Balls, Power Puff and Wrinkly"

"And together we shall form The Incredible Hunks. And Wrinkly."

"Now come on, to the Super Lair!"  
The new superheroes were just leaving to search for wherever danger was calling when the door opened. They froze, for it wasn't unlikely that those psychotic screams had attracted worldwide attention.

But this time it was Professor Slughorn who emerged through the door. He would probably have questioned just why Sirius was flying and James had corkscrew limbs when he was sneezed through the door and passed out under falling dungeon walls.


	3. Chapter 3

The Mischief Managers

Chaper 3: The Conk

Being part of a proper superhero band was one of the things that James had always dreamed of. Everyday they fought injustice, stopped wicked Slytherins from harassing innocent Gryffindors, stopped innocent Gryffindors from being punished by teachers, stopped wicked teachers from getting their greedy hands on some powerful relic, stopped prefects who told them to not cause such rumpus, and always using their new powers. And one day it got better. A terrible evil was plaguing the halls and attacking the unsuspecting, somebody so elusive and well blended with the shadows his true identity was as of yet unknown. This somebody, who was simply known as The Conk, would lurk behind walls and pillars at any hour of the day and he preyed on anybody who had their back turned. Somehow he seemed to have a keen nose for where he was least expected at any given time and his deeds were so gruesome and unchivalrous that witches were afraid to walk alone, lest they'd have their hair covered in gummy bears.

Although James normally enjoyed Magical Crafts and adding new cores to his Ziggy Stardust, he couldn't focus today; all he could think about was The Conk, where he was, what he was planning and how he was always gone from the scene of crime long before the cries of violation were heard.

Every creaking door, every howling wind, every laughter that rang a little too loudly sounded like a distress call. Ever since the word had started going around about this atrocious being, clocks dragged worse than ever.

"Alright you got ten minutes." said Professor Derwent. "Time to wrap up"

James sealed off the core opening and then he was ready to leave. Sirius was still adding finishing touches to his pocket mirror. Remus dismantled his hemp tent and stuffed it in the latest bottomless pocket he had sewn inside his hemp bag while Peter eeled out of his bottomless fondue pot with his arms full of Chinese souveneirs.

"Come on!" said James impatiently. "We've got to be ready"

"In a _minute!"_ Sirius snapped and tested out the most recent addition to his multi-box; a disc of fine sandpaper which he used as a nailfiler.

Somebody cried on the other end of the building and the boys dropped everything as they rushed to locate the source. The repeated screams of anguish led them to the area of the reputed prefect spa, where mirrors lined the walls for the newly cleansed when they came out from the bath that, according to them, was the bath of the heavens. Or would be, if it wasn't for one peeping ghost.

"Save me!" Cas cried at one of the mirrors while Mac plucked white gummy bears from her hair. "Save me please!"

"I don't understand this choice." said Mac and just dropped each gummy bear on the floor as she picked them out. "Gummy bears aren't remotely practical."

James looked in the mirrors and around all the nearby pillars and corners.

"Damn we lost him again!" he said and rammed his fist in the wall. "It's because of crimes like these I have started drinking."

"Did you see him at all?" Sirius asked.

"Very briefly, in that mirror there" said Mac. "I saw his cape. To think I didn't see more, although we were surrounded by mirrors."

"Don't blame yourself." said James.  
"I wasn't."

Sirius picked the last gummy bear from Cas's hair.

"And these are the gummy bears he threw at you? We better take it to the lab and run some tests."

James sighed. "We're superheroes, 'though. Batman doesn't run tests, that's for the police!"

"In that case I'd rather be the police bye!" said Sirius and bounced down the stairs, followed by Remus. Peter seemed unable to decide who to follow, but he needed not be for although they played superheroes wrong and seemed to be more interested in playing Warlock Gnomes there was no way James was going to let them play without him.

When he and Peter made it to the lab Sirius and Remus were already in the last labcoats and were cutting up the gummy bear and sticking bits in petri dishes. Remus was already looking at one piece through a microscope beside his Roofie Potion preperations.

"Hey I think I found something." he said, turning a button on the side. "If I zoom in, I swear a piece of the gummy face is frowning."

"Let me see." said James and Remus moved aside to make room. "That is indeed one grumpy gummy face. But what does it mean?"

"It means that The Conk is grumpy but we could have guessed that." said Sirius, now spooning some of the super potion into a petridish for analysis.

James left the microscope and picked up a piece of chalk from the blackboard rack.

"You want to play police. Well, ok. Who fits this picture?"

He wrote 'The Conk' at the center of the board and encircled it, and from there he drew lines and attached the words 'Grumpy' and 'gummy bears', as well as 'Cape'.

"You can add 'Hates bubble gum' to that," said Sirius, analysing the potion through another microscope, "because when I zoom in on the super potion I see little gelatinous pieces, and some of them are frowning."

"Ok." said James and added 'Hates bubble gum' to the board. "We're looking for somebody who hates bubble gum and likes gummy bears and is grumpy. But just who would hate bubble gum? Roy?"

"He hates all sweets and he isn't grumpy and also he has a very pretty conk."

"If we rule out everybody with pretty conks we're only left with Snape, it's too easy and besides, I thought he couldn't got out in daylight."

"I have a question." said Remus. "Why do you assume it is one person?"

"Because. The gummy bears, they're everywhere." said Sirius.

"You forgot to add 'good finder'. Snape couldn't find a tent at the circus."

"I suppose Fletcher might want to ruin your potion if you insulted his finding enough, but his conk is not what would strike you in a silhouette."

"Oh no, I'm sure it was Snape that ruined my potion. My hair's been feeling a little gross lately."

"Mine did too you should probably wash it before it becomes worse go just go now you can use my stuff the strongest hurry!" said Sirius, practically shoving Remus out of the lab.  
"Alright. Although... You're not trying to get rid of me to perfect my potion again, are you?"

"I couldn't those were Fletcher's last shrooms and the season is over"

"You still have your LAP."

"I honestly just don't want to associate with people with bad hair so please go and save yours while you still can, the longer you leave it the more difficult it will be to fix!"

"You flatter in the most indirect ways not." said James.

"How's your hair?"

"Fine. It was a little dry before so now it's perfect. Now I believe in restoring balances."

"I'm glad. Anyway the illegal stuff is on the top shelf and please don't read the ingredients and production descriptions ok and I will see you later!" said Sirius and closed Remus out of the lab. Then he went back to his microscope. James wanted to look at the potion as well and put down the chalk.

"Oh yes, that is a lot of grump" he said, looking at the potion. "But there is a difference I think. The pieces from the potion vary in colour, but all the gummy bears in Cas's hair were white."

The mystery of The Conk, that had briefly seemed so easy to the point of obvious, was a mystery again. Somebody was going around with a description that didn't fit anybody they could think of, somebody, it seemed like, who wanted to be confused with Snape and very likely wore a false nose. Somebody who at first had only seemed like a bitter attention seeking tit but had turned out to be an attention seeking tit playing the part of a bitter attention seeking tit. Now The Conk had become a genuinely interesting villain to the new superheroes and James and Sirius couldn't help but suspect eachother for running around with fake noses pretending to be Snape was just the sort of thing they'd do. And somebody had beaten them to it! The Conk, what an awesome and intelligent as well as handsome person he had to be under that cape and nose.


	4. Chapter 4

The Mischief Managers

Chapter 4: An Unexpected Intervention

Eventually the boys grew tired of The Conk and his gummy bears. They also got tired from limiting their crime fighting to the confining walls of Hogwarts, it just wasn't enough anymore. They wanted to fight real crimes! Real crimes in the real world, with real criminals!

As soon as the weekend came they took half their breakfast to Hogsmead, where thiefs were sure to lurk behind every corner, murderers in every alley way and flashers in every trenchcoat.

To maintain some uniformity within their new supergroup they had all snagged a wig each from various past school variety shows; James a barrister wig, Sirius a braided Cleopatra wig, Remus a Marylin Monroe wig and Peter an earwig (that was, a wig comprised of ears. That wig had been the punchline of a sketch a year or two ago.) They also had Groucho glasses in their coats to complement the super-spandex suits and super capes that they needed to practice spinning into.

"Well it seems pretty boring right now." said James. "Let's just practice our spins behind Tom's Foolery.

Tom's Foolery was the new big novelty shop. It had put several smaller novelty shops out of business in Diagon Alley already, and now it was going to do the same in Hogsmead.

By the containers behind the grocery beside Tom's Foolery, the boys stopped to practice their super-spin, which was fun in itself, but they wished a robber would steal somebody's purse already. Or for a cat to get stuck in a tree somewhere, that would still be better than nothing.

"The crime rate is higher in Diagon Alley." said Sirius.

"If I was a superhero, which I am," said James, "I'd want to be one step ahead! I'd know where the criminals were before they did! Now, where is that newspaper?"

"In your hands, before your face."

"I wouldn't read of past crimes," James went on, browsing, "but of discovered jewels, and restored paintings! _'_ A rare Larue Larue restored. Larue Larue was very influential in the modern arts'"

James yawned. "Why'd it have to be _modern_ arts?"

"How about that camping site with all those refugees?" Remus suggested.

"What about it?"

"Terrorists set fire to it all the time."

"Do they?"

"It's all there on the last page, below the opening hours to the Postal Stamps Museum. Here, take my magnifying glass."

James did so, and putting the magnifying glass to his glasses he could only just barely make out the little article.

"'The Hogsmead camp site was set fire to again last night, for the third time this week. Twelve babies dead. The aurors are still looking into it but say they are vastly understaffed.' Doesn't say anything about a terrorist attack, 'though." said James and returned the magnifying glass.

"Hey wasn't there a suspected bomb at the Racist Comics Headquarters?" Sirius asked.

"That was yesterday and lots of suspected refugees have been arrested."

It looked like that camp site was their only hope to showcase their new powers today. They flooed their way to the outskirts of Hogsmead and walked in the direction of the lake, turning left at the camp site signpost and following the path until they reached their destination.

The campsite was messy. Champagne bottles everywhere, scattered outside several caravans. In one caravan somebody was playing a melancholy tune on an accordion. Apart from that it was pretty quiet. If there really was a terrorist setting fire to this camp site he was not here.

The door to one caravan opened. A woman in a beret and poloneck stood in the opening, looking horrified.

"Who are you?" she asked, trembling. "Please, leave us alone! We have nowhere to go! We have nowhere to go!"

She sank down on her knees, crying floods. A man, also in a beret and poloneck, came and comforted her.

"Forgive Giselle, for we are all so very, very afraid! We've reached a point where it's like everybody could be a working class terrorist from Paris, here to take us to the guillotine! If it hadn't been for the brave The Cloak we would all have been beheaded in our homeland long ago!"

Terrorism was just never ok, not even if it was directed to upper class French people who just wanted to keep poverty around for their own comfort. Violence was just never the answer, unless a prophecy said so of course. In any case, tragic tale aside, it really was boring and quiet right now. That was, until cackling rang through the air and everybody froze and turned to face the source.

A pack of feral looking men and women and boys and girls stood at the sign post. They were all dressed in rags, had sexy wild hair and claws and teeth that had not seen a file in a lifetime. And their eyes glowed intensely yellow.

"Oh no!" a woman cried and put a hand to her forehead. "It's the w-w-w-w...!"

Then she fainted. And put on some lipstick.

"I knew we should have opted for brick houses!" cried another.

"You think you can just come here and take our site and get away with it?" said the pack leader, who could be recognised from his sheep skin cape. "You're all ground beef now!"

"Please...!" a man begged. "We were assigned this place!"

It was all so confusing. Never before had the line between good and evil been so blurry. The boys just wanted to leave to find a place where the line between good and evil was more clearly defined and involved less politics.

"If only the French guys somehow turned out to be the bad guys." said James, and looked around for signs of ulterior motifs. In doing so he saw Giselle leaning towards her husband with a sinister look in her eyes.

"Ever since their woodland was torn down for this camp site they've had to go to the streets. Come October and Hogsmead will see not one but two blood baths!"

"Yeees my darling." said the husband, clasping his fingers. "Chaos, pandemonium everywhere. And it's from those bloody remains we shall rise to power, like a blood phoenix, like the Grand Sorcier promised..."

They laughed quietly and caressed their wooden stakes.

The pack ran forth and began to slash away, and the campers raised their poles in defence. This was already getting bloody. The boys spun into their spandexes, wigs and Groucho glasses and joined the fight. Or specifically, James and Sirius joined the fight. Peter never joined a fight unless he was asked, and he wasn't very good either. Remus was too embarassed over having a pack of stereotypes making him look bad to participate.

"Hey how about some wind I see some campers over there." said Sirius, bouncing out of harms way at each attempted attack and jellifying with success while James moved on spring legs and levitated people into the lake.

"I don't think so." Remus replied and kept his eyes down.

"Are you just going to stand around and do nothing?"

Remus held out his left hand and five campers behind Sirius were cocooned in strings of bubble gum.

"I get that you're a bubble gum Spiderman, that's old news. Use you wind power."

"I _can't._ They're already looking at me funny! And sticking to thing hasn't been remotely useful."

Sirius bounced off to jellify some more campers and stakes, riding on breezes that naure offered when he could. The campers were shrinking in numbers. James and Sirius were so vastly superior and thought they'd win this fight for sure when it began to rain silver gummy bears. The pack screamed in anguish as they weakened while the campers praised the The Cloak. The Cloak sure bore an uncanny resemblance to The Conk, who seemed to have a superpower of his own: flying. He jumped from caravan to caravan with ease, always out of harms way, and would surely have showered the pack with silver gummy bears until they died hadn't a cascade of solid gumballs exploded in his face and forced him to retreat. James was already bouncing after him when Sirius pinballed along.

They followed him from the camp site and through a deepening forest, casting several spells, none of which seemed to stick. And The Conk kept rising higher, and getting further away.

"Look at that." said James. "It's not a superpower after all. I can see the brush poking out under the cloak."

Sirius jellified it in a flash. The Conk fell as if shot and the boys continued through the forest, where he had to be now, moaning over broken bones. But they neither saw him nor heard him anywhere. All they found was bits of jellified broomsticks and some white gummy bears, glittering with small flakes of edible silver.

It was not for nothing that Snape was so wellversed in the potions art. People thought he was a natural talent, and certainly that helped, but these idiots just didn't understand how hard he worked every single night towards the goal of one day being considered a master. Not one night had passed without him brewing in the lab since he had started at Hogwarts, he even came here at Christmas and New Years.

It had been lonely, at first, and brewing had been a welcome distraction. But then he had met Reggie, who didn't come to the labs to brew but to do his homework someplace where he could get away from idle background chatter, and wherever Snape was, nobody would want to be near chatting idly.

The Gullibus Potion, which rendered the drinker gullible enough to believe anything he was told, had been left to itself tonight. Tonight he was making his own gummy bears. Only an hour had passed since the start and the transparent potion had already taken a gelatinous constistency that held it's shape when dropped in a glass of water. The gummy bear mold stood ready.

"Now then," he mumbled, "what qualities should I give it?"

His mind went blank. This wasn't bubble gum, this was gummy bears. The bubble gum potion had been an attempt to heighten normal bubble gum qualities, but gummy bears didn't have any qualities. It had one form, and that was the form of a tiny bear. Suddenly Snape hated his potion and poured it all out in the sink angrily.

"Stupid gummy bears do nothing!"

"What is the appropriate thing to do when encountering a wendigo?" Reggie asked, reading from the question page of his textbook. "Is 'run' ever a good answer?"

"If you run from something without legs absolutely."

"'Cut their legs off.'"

Reggie jotted that down. "How are your enhanced gummy bears coming along?"

"Don't talk to me about gummy bears. Gummy bears suck!"

"So, why then-"

"I should have thought of bubble gum! I liked bubble gum _first!"_

"Can you know that for sure?"

"But I know that bubble gum is for little girls with ringlets so I quit it! If I had known I could use it to stop wendigos in their path, shield myself from attacks and float in water, why even..."

Snape put a lid on an empty cauldron and thought of how bubble gum even could be used to seal it to prevent sabotaging. So simple, yet so efficient. If it was heatproof as well he could skip the lid if he so wished. But using bubble gum for anything ever was not an alternative for him, there was no way he'd ever do anything any _dumb freak_ had thought of, most likely by accident! At least he had comfort in the fact that he had sabotaged his potion.

"That's the Halfblood Prince 1, freak 0..." he mumbled, pleased.

"Why do you call yourself that?" Reggie asked.

"What?"

"The Halfblood Prince? As if you're half mudblood and proud of it? I don't get it, is it ironic?"

"That's not half mudblood but half pureblood." Snape explained.

"No such thing as half pureblood, as any real pureblood will tell you."

"The point is that the half that is pure is _very_ pure."

Reggie laughed, a little more than it was funny. "Why 'prince'?"

"What's wrong with 'prince'?"

"You're not a prince for a start."

"Elvis is not actually a king, either."

"Oh, so you're like the prince of something? Of what? Halfbloods? You are to halfbloods what Elvis is to rock and roll, except lower than that?"

Reggie laughed some more, not mockingly but _still._ He was truly insufferably arrogant tonight, and Snape hoped he wasn't 'coming out of his shell' or something.

"Who's the king, then?"

He could laugh, but Snape could laugh, too.

"You make some interesting points, w1ck3dl0ck61."

Reggie paled. Snape had certainly not missed his little stories in the school paper fanfic page.

"'It's not how much you know that determines if you're clever, but what you do with what you know.' Why do you call yourself Wickedlock? Is it ironic?"

"What will you do now that your gummy bears didn't work out?"

"I'll probably just ruin some potions and call it a night. It's never too early to practice villainy. People are already talking about me, and my wicked deeds. 'Who is he?' 'When will he strike?' 'How does he do it?' They fear me, and awe me, the Halfblood Prince!"

"I think they just call you The Conk."

"The Conk isn't me! I don't pelt gummy bears at the unsuspecting!"

"Well it's him everybody talks about and everybody knows it's you."

"If it was me they'd know me as the Halfblood Prince!"

"I think since they don't like you much they rather call you The Conk, but perhaps you could compromise and change to the Halfblood Conk!"

And now he was laughing again at something that wasn't remotely funny. Snape often felt like smacking him, but now he was ready to actually do it.

"Damn it I thought you were wicked!"

"I am wicked see I'm making fun of you and everything."

"You're not supposed to make fun of your fellow Junior Eaters!"

"But there's nobody else here."

"If you're just going to be an annoying twat you can just get out."

"I'm sorry. It's just, once you start it's difficult to stop. Anyway, it would make sense if The Conk was you, since The Conk appeared around the same time as you gave them superpowers."

"Gave who superpowers?"

"You know, Sirius, Potter, Loopy and Pettigrew. Or, as I like to call them, the Fab _Bore!"_

"That was terrible. Why-"

"The _Snorefest_ of the _Asspocalypse!"_

"Why do you think I gave them superpowers? I didn't even know they had superpowers."  
"Because that's what they said when I spied on them some days ago. Somehow your gummy bears made it happen. So what's the plan?"

"Gummy bears don't cause superpowers."

"Oh. I guess it must have been the shrooms then that does sound more plausible."  
"Shrooms?"

Of course, Snape thought, gummy bears combined with shrooms could very well create a potent ability enhancer. And of course he had noticed those Gryffinpricks showing off some unusual abilities, but he hadn't thought it would occur _to_ them to use them for more than just showing off, or seen anything heroic in their show-offy behaviour.

He went inside lab A, to where the bubblegum potion had stood before, where a fine black dust still covered the corner of the table. He ran a finger across it.

"Spores. Of course. I really _am_ stupid. I thought it was dry mascara."

"I thought it was a type of tobacco ash" said Reggie.

"Tell me about their powers."

"Oh you know, pretty much everything any enhanced bubblegum could do. Bouncing, stretching, that sort of thing. A bit of limited flying too, I think."

"That makes sense. Well I did not intend to give them powers and nor do I intend for them to hold on to them. The powers alone are against several rules. No magic in the halls, no ability enhancers, and no flying to name three"  
Reggie put his fingers together and sneered. "Then we better alert professors mwahahahaha!"

Snape sighed. Some people really were all beauty and no brains. Poor Reggie, perhaps his low intellect was the reason for his underdeveloped wickedness. Genetics was certainly not the answer.  
"What good will that do? We can't go to Professor McGonagall because they are her pets, and Slughorn..."

"Collects little boys." Reggie nodded.

"And he lacks backbone. Which leaves..."

"Professor Sprout."

"No, you and me! We must sabotage their potion _again!"  
_ "Ok how?"

Reggie was like a puppy, so eager to please, moldable and desperate for approval. He really had to have the worst self esteem for not realising he could probably get people to serve him by strutting around snootily. But all the better for Snape, who fetched from a cabinet a bag of Briar's Weed.

"You must put this in their potion. That shall, ahem, take down their high a bit. They won't do any more bouncing after this."  
Reggie set to perform the order straight away and had to leave the labs to fulfill it since the superheroes actually had enough cells in their brains to keep it safe this time. Or _safer._

Snape would have liked to mix some of that Gullibus potion in the Superpotion, but it wasn't ready. And besides, that was for a whole nother plan.


	5. Chapter 5

The Mischief Managers

Chapter 5: Lestrange and Lestrange

It was miserable, having to wake up from a weeklong sleep in the hospital wing after being injected with bottled TLFK potion, only to find that not only were the powers gone, but the potion sabotaged. At least the boys had woken up on a Saturday morning as opposed to a Monday morning and could at least look forward to a weekend in the crisp open town air. Well, those who weren't cursed could look forward to the weekend and not be too preoccupied by the fact that there was a fullmoon following it.

"Well it was fun while it lasted." said James, still reading the same newspaper hourly. "We don't need superpowers. Batman doesn't have superpowers, he has gadgets."

The boys had been strolling for hours and stopped to sit down on the fountain on Hogsmead Square, where the only thing that flowed this time of year was fallen willow leaves.

"The season is never over in the Netherlands..." Sirius thought.

"How about we check out the sale at Bonkers again. It's going to close in a week already."

"But we were there only three months ago and only the crap was left then too."

"'It's not what you have that matters, but what you make of it'."

"Who quotes themselves, seriously?"

"Come on it's better than sitting here being bored."  
That was true, and Bonkers was just around the corner from the cinema.

The shop was empty of costumers and it was not hard to see why for there were only precisely four items left that had remained unsold; one rubber chicken, a package of ten Chinese finger traps, a snake nut can and a novelty boob apron.

"Good afternoon!" said the shopkeeper desperately.

"Hello. And good bye." said Sirius, already turning back.

"No please wait!" the shopkeeper begged. "Two for one, what do you say?"

"No." said James.

"Ok how much do you want me to pay you for one, then?"

Pay them? "Huh?"

"It's meaningless, having to stand in a shop and sell the four last items that nobody wants. I just want to close the doors already. I'd throw it away, except I must stay here until they are sold until the shop closes. So yes, I would actually pay you to take them. I have matiné tickets to The Man of La Mancha because I thought I'd be out by now!"

"A hundred each." said Sirius.

"I can pay less than that."

"Yet you haven't. What's the deal? Oh, are they _cursed?"_

"No I'm afraid they're just lame. I can offer you ten each and if you still decline I'll put up an ad offering the lot for five"

It was a deal and the boys took the money and left the shop. But alas, the shopkeeper caught up with them.

"Wait you have to take the things, too!" he said, forced a paperbag on them and turned back.

Sirius was quick to take out the rubber chicken while James still looked in the bag.

"These will never go out of style, 'though" he said and spun it around some.

James decided he wanted the finger traps for himself and divided the remaining items like a clown Santa Claus.

"I think the snake nut can is right for you" he said and gave the can to Remus and then the boob apron to Peter. "There you are"

Their new items entertained them for such a short time they didn't even notice it. After that they crossed the square and followed the street to the Church of Galinda, where news reported a couple had disappeared after a funeral ealier that week.

"'Aurors suspect kidnapping.' _"_ James read from a newspaper. "This sounds like a mission for the Incredible Hunks and Wrinkly!"  
"We're out of powers" said Sirius. "Wrinkly is no longer Wrinkly"

"Fair point we'll work on the name. The Incredible Hunks and Trotty"

The trees stood largely naked, shedded leaves lied allover. The graveyard was unvisited at this hour of this day. The door to the church was unlocked which suggested it was boring.

"Unless..." said Sirius, tapping his chin.

"Nope it's most likely boring" said James.

If the priest was nearby and available for interrogation that wouldn't be so boring. But the boys couldn't be bothered to look for him, at least not just yet.

"Ok so they were kidnapped after the funeral" said James and envisioned a scenario where funeral guests wept by the grave, not noticing a pair of sneaky criminals in black eye masks and hats sneaking up behind a mourning couple, shoved rags of chloroform in their face so they'd pass out and then just pulled them away to their car.

"That must be how it happened"

"Quick question: who were kidnapped?" Remus asked, being a little slow and distracted today.

"Funeral guests"

"Oh ok"

"Who else would be kidnapped from a funeral?"

"The dead guy?"

"I think the article would have specified if they had kidnapped the dead"  
"Aha, so it didn't?"

"Why would anybody kidnap the dead, and after a funeral on top of that?"

"I could think of lots of reason if you let me sleep on it"

"Quick question" said Sirius. "The article said: 'Couple disappeared.' Couple of what?"

"There are double funerals"

"You don't kidnap the dead after funerals. You dig them up much later"

"It did say 'couple _disappeared',_ didn't it?" said James, now envisioning a magician in top hat and cape circling the two open caskets, covering both with a piece of cloth and when he pulled it off the corpses were gone. Everybody clapped and the magician bowed humbly.

"They were probably just bored and left" said Sirius, making burnt marks in the fanatasy bubble with his newly lit cigarette.

"Just what would Warlock Gnomes do?" James asked at sat down on a tombstone.

"He'd go to the police" said Remus. "Or they would go to him"  
"Or, would he look for things coincidentally dropped as clues?"

"Can you recognize 243 different types of tobacco ashes?"

"Can you get crime reception on your knitting needles yet?"

Remus put away his homework and took up his knitting, because apparently knitting helped Miss. Marble be more in tune with her criminal surroundings.

James got up from the stone, bored and wishing zombies would just burst from their graves or something.

"Aha!" he said, noticing a clue on the tombstone where he had just sat. "A type of ash! And it's still warm!"

Looking up he found that it was just Sirius who was knocking off ash on tombstones, like he sometimes did when he was bored and wanted to irritate Warlock Gnomes wannabes.

"Don't contaminate the crime scene!" James told him off.

"You're contaminating the crime scene with your face!"

"Now who's quoting himself?"

"Shush do you hear that?" Remus asked, frozen in his knitting.

There was something muffled under the whistling wind that couldn't quite be dismissed as distant traffic or wildlife. The moments the loud weather paused the boys could swear a faint distress call was coming from below ground and they put their ears to the wet grass, listening attentively.

"It sounds like... 'no, peas, no'" said Peter.

There was no doubt that a culinary offence was being committed very near to them. The boys put on their Groucho glasses and wigs and did their super-spandex-change spin, like they had practiced so digilently once or twice a few weeks ago. Then they began to fire explosive charms at the ground, trying the best they could to avoid being hit by bits of corpse.

Tied to their own kitchen chairs in the druid home just across the street from the Church of Galinda, the druids trembled with fear. Three days had passed since they last ate and they had to be hungry now. Rod Lestrange pressed his sharp edged 10 mm sorbet scoop into the dead mudblood's body one last time, scooping out a pea sized chunk of muscle tissue and placed it for his younger brother Rab to dip it in green candy melts and let it set on baking parchment.

One dead mudblood had yeilded enough meat peas for this occasion and Rod had still only scooped half the rump. The other dead mudblood from the double funeral would just have to be saved for later. Dead bodies could always be used for something, and mudbloods in particular were more helpful when they were dead.

"Ok" said Rab. "The meat peas have set now"

"So serve them to the druids" said Rod and threw the meat scoop in the sink and washed his hands.

Rab scraped the peas from their setting tray with a spatula and moved them to a clean plate before he brought them to the frightened druids.

"Peas?" he said, grinning wickedly and offering the plate of meat peas to the woman druid first. "Go on then. You haven't eaten for three days"

The woman druid just cracked and tears flooded from her sunken eyes.

"No, peas, no!" she cried.

"Come now, it's just peas"

"Don't fall for it, Myfanwy" said the other druid. "They are obviously cursed or poisoned somehow"

"Thanks, Gareth, you're so observant"

"Alright" said Rab and offered the plate to Gareth instad. "Peas?"

Gareth licked his mouth and saliva ran from the corner of his mouth. Rab had a spoon ready.

"Maybe just one..." said Gareth.

"It's human meat!" Myfanwy cried.

"They're already dead aren't they shame to waste it"

"Our thoughts exactly" said Rab and spooned him a heap.

"Don't, for Merlin's sake!" said Myfanwy. "If you eat human meat something terrible will happen to you!"  
"Mmm, meat..." said Gareth and his mouth opened more and more as the spoon of meat peas was brought closer and closer. Finally, Rod thought, as he watched the scene. Once Gareth had some peas, Myfanwy would see how harmless it was and want peas, too, and then he, Rod, could finally go home and finish enveloping wedding invitations in front of the French news.

The spoon of peas was almost touching Gareth's lips when Myfanwy, being tied to a chair just beside him, spat him right in the face.

"Blegh Myfanwy gross what the hell was that!" said Gareth, repulsed and grimacing, forgetting the peas for a moment. Rab sighed and put down the plate by the toaster.

"Why can't we just force them?" he asked Rod.

"They have to do it willingly, or it will not work" Rod replied. "They're hungry, it'll happen today"

Perhaps it hadn't been such a smart idea to scoop meat from dead bodies and dip them in candy melts right before their eyes. If they kept resisting the brothers would just have to cut out their livers and turn them into foie gras, because who could resist foie gras? Rod took the plate of meat peas to the druids for one last try.

"Are you absolutely sure you don't want meat peas?"

"Of course we're sure we'd rather die!" said Myfanwy foolishly. With her three available alternatives she'd end up dead so she could just as well just have the peas.

"Alright" said Rod and put down the peas again. "Get all the fat you can find, Rab"

While Rab searched the refridgerator and cuboards for butter, margarine and oils, Rod found in the drawers some piping bags, rather small but they would just have to do. Having understood, Rab also mixed all the fat he found together in a bowl with a wooden spoon.

"That's enough" said Rod and stuffed the piping bag with the fat mixture, made sure to squeeze out air bubbles and needed not tell Rab to go and open Myfanwy's mouth for him.

"What are you doing?" Gareth asked.

"Fattening her up" said Rod.

"Oh ok good she's turned a bit skinny"

"No take Gareth instead!" cried Myfanwy, muffled.

Fattening up their livers would be a long procedure, and it was on a complete impulse that Rod had decided to do it. He didn't even know what he'd do with their foie gras yet but he'd think of something. As for the peas, they would just have to freeze them and sneak them into the supermarket. Both the Dark Lord and the Grand Sorcier would be so impressed with his work, Rod thought, and he'd be doubly rewarded for sure, that was just one of the perks of being part of two villainous orders.

Myfanwy squirmed and gagged as fat was squeezed down her throat.

"Please" she said when she was allowed to catch her breath. "Can't you just have your way with me?"

"No way you'd just like it you gross half mudblood" said Rod and stuck the piping bag back inside her mouth.

And also, he thought, this was so much better. He'd probably not mention this to Bella, lest she found it cheating. Oh Bella, beautiful and wicked Bella! Thinking of her, and seeing her before his eyes made him feel all warm and fuzzy inside and imagining he was piping her full of fat put him in such a trance like state. He didn't hear or see anything else for a moment until he heard the hat rack in the hall fall off the wall, hit the little desk and knock down the umbrella stand, and was thusly cruelly jerked back to reality.

"What was that?" Rab asked, already putting on his venetian mask and leaving the kitchen to see what was causing the chaos. Rod put down the half empty piping bag, annoyed to be delayed in his villainous task when he had hoped to go home early, and left to see who it was he had to take it out on today.

A fallen umbrella was poking James in the backside where he sat in a puddle of shoes in the druid house hall and it was not happy to see him. He put his Groucho glasses back on, over his regular glasses.

"Nice going, knocking down the hatrack!" he told Sirius, trying not to trip on boots getting up.

"And you" Sirius rebuffed, kicking some shoehorns out of his way. "Nice somersaulting _right into me!"  
_ "I _said:_ out of the way!"  
"Please just _please_ will you shut up?" Remus begged. "There are _Death Eaters_ in there!"

"If they've noticed us it's his fault and not mine" said Sirius.

"I don't _care"_

"Yeah just drop it already" said James. "And also it was your fault but I forgive you so can we please just drop this?"

"There is a time and place for pretending to be in an action movie" said Sirius. "I suggest you learn when it's not appropriate"

" _Shut up!"_ Remus pleaded.

"Yeah shut up!" James quite agreed.

Sirius shoved him into the wall so therefore James shoved him back into the other wall. Therefore Sirius whacked him over the head with his new rubber chicken. He thought he was winning, but he was wrong. James put on his Chinese finger traps and let their tips entangle Sirius like a Devil's Snare Devil's Snare, laughing at the surprised look on his face when he was pulled to the floor by his wrists.

Now was probably a good time to get on with their investigation, James thought. He had made his point and was just about to free Sirius's from the traps when he was yanked to the floor by his own gadget that Sirius were tugging at now at the other end.

Yanking eachother here and there and being unable to get unstuck they didn't notice that a wizard in a venetian mask had been trying to get their attention for some time.

" _EXCUSE ME!"_ he said until he had their attention.

So he wasn't a Death Eater, but he was part of some sinister club, judging from the macabre mask and apron.

"Yes what is it?" Sirius asked.

"Well, well, well" said the cook villainously. "What do we have here?"

That question was a bit difficult to answer. Another man in a venetian mask came by with a sauté pan.

"Don't just stand there and stall!" he reproached.

"But the villain school said to give the victims enough time to form plans"

The second wizard clearly had little respect for the villain school for he twirled his pan around and knocked out each of the boys like dominoes with a single throw.

When James regained consciousness he found he had been tied to a chair in a small kitchen with his mates as well as two gagged druids. He was relieved that his fingertraps were still intact and no longer stuck to Sirius, but he didn't much like the sight of the chewing marks at the tips and the fur.

The men in the venetian masks were watching them; one through a red mask and the other through a blue one. Although their faces were concealed, they radiated so much inner wickedness that they were most definitely necromancers.

"So, don't tell me" said the man with the blue mask. "You saw that 'Aurors Seek Snooping Orphans' ad, killed your parents to be accepted, all to get money and women. Well, since you're here anyway, humour me. How exactly were your spandex suits and capes going to help you children take us on?"

'Children'? Couldn't he tell how fourteen they were? The man with the blue mask ran his long and thin wand under their chins, lingering by Remus who sat at the end of the row, nodding off. The man clapped loudly to wake him from his beginning slumber.

"You are eager for your final rest, aren't you?"

Remus looked from the wand under his chin to the mask on the man's face.

"Erm tell me about your childhood?" he tried.

"SILENCE! I was extremely loved, so HA!"

He stepped back and summoned a box of peas.

"Now you're all done for. But before I kill you all... Peas?"

He removed the lid and offered the box of peas to Peter first. The druids jumped and protested in their chairs. The man in the red mask picked up a sauté pan and knocked them out.

"It's peas or fat" said the man in the blue mask. "but I don't think you'll need the latter, in fact..."

He put away the box and summoned scissors, cut open Peter's spandex just below his chest and asked for a marker.

"Here you are" said his partner and passed him a pen and the man in the blue mask began to mark out the liver. Peter trembled and sniffed as he was being drawn on. It was a terrible thing for anybody to go though but that was just the risk that came with being a superhero.

"I can't watch this I hate liver" said Sirius and looked away.

"What do you want to do with the others?" asked the man in the red mask when he had filled the freezer with peas.

"Uhm... Just kill them. I don't want to be here all day, I have tickets to Man of La Mancha"

"Alright" said the man in the red mask and decided to start with Remus. " _Avada Ked-"_

"Hey leave him alone!" Sirius protested.

"Or _what?"_

The trail of a shadow shot through the kitchen and white gummy bears rained over the cooks faster than they had time to react.

"What the-"

" _Or"_ came a new voice from an undefined source. "You will have to answer to The Cape!"

The Cape was so fast that all that was seen of him was a blur and no matter how the men fired away no curse would stick. The Cape zapped around, showering everybody with gummy bears and whacking the men with their own sauté pan faster than they could say quoi and when it became quiet after his departure James almost didn't notice that they had all been untied.

"Was that The Conk?" he asked, confused as to who's side he was on and annoyed that he was a better superhero.

"I think he said he was The Cape" said Peter, in awe.

"Just shut up will you"

"What crawled up your finger trap?" Sirius asked.

"Didn't you see how organised he was? I didn't know we had competition"

The boys found the gag items they had lost and took all the peas from the freezer before leaving, embarassed to have been rescued like damsels and motivated to improve their routine and become serious.


	6. Chapter 6

The Mischief Managers

Chapter 6: The Mischief Managers

Trainers squeaked against the green floor and two foam balls swished back and forth between the teams in the sports hall. In about five minutes Professor Saddist would surely blow the whistle and say it was time to pack up. Not that it mattered to Remus because he had a golden ticket to never having to participate in this class ever again at least for some time. At first he had hesitated about lying to Saddist about increased adrenaline levels making him angry and predatorial, but then he had thought that, hey, witches faked it all the time so why couldn't he? And there was nobody, not Pomfrey, not McGonagall, who even dared disprove this claimed experience. Sure it would probably not do him any favours in the long run but in the short run he just wanted to be less humiliated on a weekly. He didn't like Saddist much, because it was scienticically proven that physical education teachers were low functioning sociopaths, so it was pretty fun to have him be too afraid of him to make snide remarks about his inferior coordination.

Of course, if anybody else asked why he wasn't participating, he just said he had forgotten his shorts.

Saddist blew his whistle and foam balls were tossed back in the basket, and bags with change of clothes collected.

"We're going to shower don't go anywhere" said James when he stopped by to pick up his Tizer and Sirius his Schweppes.

"Boredom makes me angry and predatorial so why can't I get out of history class?" Sirius asked.

"Have you tried?"

"Yeah!" said Sirius and brushed away some hair to just casually expose his neck, like he sometimes did as one of his more rude and insensitive 'jokes' and really couldn't see what was so rude about it.

"That's rude!" Remus told him off.

"No it isn't!"

"That's like dangling a piece of cake in front of a person!"

"Oh really what cake?"

"Or money"  
Sirius let the hair fall back slowly.

"Ok that was rude. Although, if it really was like money we'd have all been split by now and people would fear me"

"Well I'm glad your idea is still entirely wrong"

"No, your idea is still entirely wrong"

Sometimes he was more annoying than a blue moon when he thought he knew what he was talking about, but at least the latter was rare.

"Ok let's go and shower" said James. "So we can practice our super routine"

When they had gone Remus picked up his potion's notes. That Roofie Potion he had started before the coma had become overcooked and useless so he would just have to start over again. There were some things in life that just weren't meant to be, such as him and potions making for example. The universe had always conspired against those two. But this wasn't just about boosting his grades, it was about drugging Slughorn ('it was an accident!') and see what he had to say. If it felt wicked it was because it was wicked and it was that very point he was trying to prove. Roofie potions just pissed him off more than perfect circles!

After some twenty minutes James was back, wet in the hair and with a flip chart.

"'Not so fast!' is not a catchphrase!" he said and began to tear off pages that had been written on. "It's too generic"

"Exactly" said Sirius. "'Or you will have to answer to The Cape!' is too dependent on a set-up"

"How about: 'Hold it right there!'"

"'I would do that if I were you!'"  
"You know what The Cape had? He introduced himself in his catchphrase. We better act out a villainous scene, that might help. Now let's see..."

James brought down the rings and told Peter to hold on to them while he raised the rings back up.

"Wormtail will be the innocent torture victim" he explained as Peter rose higher and higher, his arms trembling from the strain. "Padfoot will be the villain and Moony and I will be the superheroes. Woops that's a little too high"

He let the rings drop back down and cut off the fall when he saw it fit.

"Ok and action!" he said and stepped away from the rings to take Remus's homework from him while Sirius did his villain act. Sirius tossed his hair back.

"Howls of derisive laughter! Prepare to die! Avada Keda-"  
"Erm maybe be a little more careful with that curse" said James, jogging into the scene.

Sirius twirled his wand, uncertain. "Was that the catchphrase?"

"Your character went to villain school. Remember to stall, ok?"

"Maybe he went to French villain school"

 _"French_ villain school? We don't want him to surrender just yet. Ok take two and action!"  
Again James left the scene to put on his Chinese finger traps while Sirius stalled more, now just wringing his rubber chicken, and looking bored.

"Well, well, well" he said. "Now I have you, and I will explain in great detail my methods and motivation and also take your questions if you have them because it is very important to me that you see how everything connects, how it was all part of my plan because... I guess I just want you to think I'm a genious or something. It's not that anybody can save you anyway and I'm not in a particular hurry, there's nothing on telly, why wouldn't I want to impress you with my own brilliance instead of just catching a movie, as if I have any respect for your intelligence or care about your opinion..."

He glanced at James, who just watched, utterly bedazzled by this villain act that revealed nothing.

"Ok I'm going to make you suffer now" said Sirius. "Jellify!"  
James ran forth and just knocked Sirius's wand to the floor, thereby turning the floor to jelly.

"You there! Stop! Will you?" said James, trying not to stumble on the wobbly gelatinous floor.

"Meh" said Sirius, picked up his wand and reversed the floor.

"Stop in the name of justice!"  
"Next"

"My arms hurt!" Peter complained.

"In the name of the Mischief Managers I command you to stop being a git!" said James.

"The Mischief Managers sounds a little beauraucratic" said Sirius. "We'd have to wear vests and bow ties"

"And have squirty flowers and carry briefcases. With briefs"  
"Oh, and have buttmasks"

"With moustaches!" they said in unison. "Jinx! Jinx again!"  
The jinx transformed them into frogs and they needed to croak in unison in order to transform back into their wizard forms. They were so excited and bubbling with ideas they didn't hear each other half the time, but managed to further agree to get green butt tattoos with tapeworms wiggling out of the cracks as well as formal shorts before rushing to the magical crafts classroom to start sewing their costumes, so confident they even thought they could sew.

The measurements were taken, the costume pieces cut from tweed and all Remus had to so was sew them together. It was sometime before dinner. James and Sirius had made very crude buttmasks by cutting out the shapes from cardboard and attaching strings to them and then drawn moustaches with a black marker and now they were perfecting their gadgets.

"The Cape is a really good superhero name" said James, letting his Chinese fingertraps extend across the room and get him a pencil sharpener, just trying out the suction runes the tips. "It's so simple and so mysterious"

"I think Mr. Chinese is very simple and mysterious" said Sirius, who himself had decided to cut up his chicken, stick a brick in it, and then add some boomerang runes to the comb. "Rubber Chicken Man, very simple and mysterious. Not-Actually-Nuts, not very accurate but then you're not actually Chinese and I'm not a chicken, so I guess our names are more ironic than they are mysterious"

He sealed his boomerang chicken and gave it a test-throw. The chicken knocked down several golems on its way back to him.

"We've talked about this" said Remus, turning off the sewing machine since he was finished and shoved the costume garments aside. "What have I said about throwing stones in glass houses?"

"Only if there are possessed scissors"

"Exactly"

He took from his bag the very large and very heavy as well as freakishly thin Grow And Care For Your Acid Marigolds by Columbina Gardner.

"I guess it's not so bad" said James. "And I am growing fond of Mr. Chinese"  
"And you can say things like: Watch out for that trap!" said Sirius. "And me: It's trouble o'cluck! That's fowl play!"

"You get the best catch phrases"

"Prepared to be rubbered the wrong way!"  
"I want an item with more catchphrase potential"

"Bonsai!" said Sirius and flung his chicken at a rat in the corner. Then he gave James the finger. "Feng Shui!"

"Did you know" said Remus. "That in latin that finger is called the digitus impudicus?"

"You should have a can that actually contains mixed wonks"

"I will not apologise for looking up potential names for spells"

"Well you should. How long will it take to grow acid marigolds?"

"At least several weeks"

"Let me see the picture" said Sirius and came to look over his shoulder. "I think I've seen Fletcher sniff flowers like that, except I just thought it was the latest banana peel"

"Really? Sometimes I wonder where he grows everything"

"Where indeed"

Speak of the devil. It was at that moment a cloud of flies swarmed into the classroom on a whiff of various mysterious odours. It was Fletcher and he had an empty basket with him, which he put down for a moment while he fetched some rune ink. Then he sat down to paint symbols on the basket that looked very vibrant until they faded and disappeared.

"Hey Fletch" said James. "Do you have acid marigolds?"

"Who wants to know?" Fletcher retorted.

"I do"

Fletcher kept painting runes nonchalantly. "Maybe I do, maybe I don't..."

"Ok great can we have some?" Sirius asked.

"I suppose I could sell you some, sure. But they're 20 each"

"Ok do you want that in kicks in the head or punches in the gut?"

"Oh, that's nice. I want it in appreciation and respect"

"Ok it's a deal"

"Oh, and money"

"Come on Fletch friends don't charge!"  
"Supposed 'friends' also don't nick their supposed 'friend's' rum crates! The things I had to face, getting that crate of rum"

"It's what the cupboard is there for"

"I still have nightmares about undead pirates"

"What if I trade you some valium?" Remus asked, looking through his pocket chemist's.

Fletcher looked tempted. Valium would really help him face undead pirates, after all.

"Well, I mean... Obviously I can give you some acid marigolds if you want, it's just that you'll probably just pass them on to _them!"_  
But Remus still sent the valium across the table. Fletcher uncapped the bottle to make sure it was real.

"Ok fine. I'll find you later, I want to finish my bottomless mushroom basket"

"Maybe he can come with you, too" said James.

"Ha ha ha, no. That's one mystery you'll never reveal"

"Not even for some morphine?" Remus coaxed.

"You have morphine? Where do you even get this stuff?"

"Do you want it or not?"

Fletcher drooled a little when he saw the box of syringes.

"Forget it" he said, wiping his mouth dirty. "You'll just gossip"  
"I promise you I won't gossip"

"You know, it's not that I don't believe you. I just don't believe that _they_ won't slip something in your tea to make you talk"

"You are so paranoid" said Sirius. "Say they'd never do that"

"They'd never do that" Remus therefore said.

"Well ok then" said Fletcher and Remus sent him the morphine.

It was less than an hour before dinner and James collected the costumes and the masks in a bag and left with Sirius and Peter to look at tattoo art in the library and hopefully begin sketching on some designs. Remus hung around waiting for Fletcher and even offered to paint the remaining runes while he had some valium.

He really had to hand it to Gus, Remus thought as he went to the library to brush the marigolds with anti-withering solution from the potions cabinet, for having thought of such a truly ingenious hiding place for his illegal growing activities. A greenhouse in an old moss grown Wolksvagen on the roof outside his dormitory, you just couldn't guess that. And Gus's logic had been flawless, too. Cars caused the greenhouse effect, therefore greenhouse car.

Evening was falling, but it was always evening in the forbidden library. James and Sirius sat in the darkest corner, already practicing the arse mark spell.

"Clunibus Vermis! Clunibus Vermis!"  
Tacky lime green strings of glittery light seeped from the tips of their wands and up in the air, forming one butt with a tapeworm squiggling out of the crack and forming a double M. It didn't hold the shape for very long but only practice could take care of that. Remus sat down and began to brush the acid marigolds. Peter was trying to make a pair of briefs levitate, and looked bothered from the perpetual lack of success.

Sirius put his wand in his robes and picked up a fine needle and dipped it in a bottle of enchanted lime green ink.

"Ok who wants to go first?" he asked, giving his design a quick look for reference while wiping off excess ink on a piece of cloth.

"I can go first" said James and unzipped his trousers.

"What are you doing?" Remus asked, not convinced he wanted to see this.

"I'm taking my trousers off"

"Why?"

"Because we had a vote and the majority agreed that getting tattooed on our butts was more in line with the image we're trying to project, that image being a butt"

"Ok but... Could we have another voting session with me?"

"I don't know" said Sirius and picked up a cup of tea. "Tea?"

"That's nice!"

"What's nice is your refusal to put the Mischief Managers before yourself!"

Remus put down his brush. "I could be doing homework instead of fooling around like this!"

"You're welcome"

"Guys let's not fight" said James. "Moony you really should have seen this coming. Everything has pointed to this. Our butt tattoos will be the crown of our work"

"I would have thought that the arse mark was the crown of our work" said Remus.

"It was the crown of our work, until we came up with this brilliant idea. But you're right, it's only fair that we vote again. If we vote again and the majority is for butt tattoos, will you accept those results?"

"No I will not accept those results"

"There you see that's why we voted without you. If you won't even vote on it then you don't get a say. Ok, ink me!"

"Right-o" said Sirius.

"Wait" said Remus, thinking that since Peter had voted against last time there was no reason he wouldn't do it again. "I do want to vote"

"Ok. Everybody for butt tattoos put up their hands"

How wrong he had been, Peter did put his hand up. Had it all been a trick?

"You're for butt tattoos?" Remus asked him.

"No" Peter replied. "But the majority was and I've already been inked, so..."

"Ha ha ha..." Sirius laughed at his clever deceit, probably thinking that giving false information was smart, or 'machiavellan'. Some people, once they discovered a new word...

The tattoo job went in a jiffy. James was already fastening his belt.

"So you both lied" said Remus. "Ok. I want out, good night"

"You can't get out now we've all been inked now except for you"

"I can and will. If you're going to lie to get your way I want no part of this"

Somebody spoke in a near part of the library, taking their minds of the conflict.

"Right" they heard Professor Romsay say. "Tonight is when they will strike, yeah"  
"Wha, tonight?" The second voice was unmistakably the upbeat voice of Professor Olivier."Are you sure, mate?"

"Very sure, Jeff. They have worked it all out, apparently, how to untangle the protective webs at the Museum of Relics. They're probably there right now"

"But how do you even know this, Norton?"

"Let's just say I have my connections. Say, what do you know about the Master's Ring? All I know is that it's dark and poweful, but I don't know any specifics"  
"I could tell you all about it, but not here, you never know if anybody's eavesdropping"

"You're all so paranoid"

"Come, let's go discuss more in the kitchen over some roasted turkey"

They could hear Professor Romsay's and Professor Olivier's swishy robes disappear.

"We better hurry" said James and finished brushing the marigolds and attached safety pins to their backs. "I sure wouldn't want to hang around here boosting my grades if I knew somebody was having a crack at stealing the Master's Ring"

He tried on his buttmask and peeked through the holes.

"No time for cracks! We must stop the rumpus!"

Ohhhh dear...

"I think I'll get a hat and call myself The Hat" said Remus, packing up to find a hat somewhere, refusing to be inked anywhere ever, even if it was removable. Then Sirius armlocked him from behind and laughed derisively.

"The only superhero you'd ever be on your own would be Babbles To Teachers Boy! And we can't let you be an independent superhero you know our secrets"

Remus squirmed, trying to get away. He could have made a nice bubble gum mummy out of Sirius, but they had this unspoken agreement of never hexing each other. Although as far as he knew, they had no mutual unspoken agreement that it was ok to tattoo each other against their will.

"So does Gus, he saw the masks"

"Maybe but he's stupid and don't register anything he can't smoke"

"Ok I won't be an independent superhero I just want to boost my grades"

But Sirius would still not let him go so Remus pushed back and shoved him right into a torch, which really hurt his back and put some of his hair on fire, forcing him to let go to put it out.

"No please don't fight" said James dully over the sports pages and tossed Sirius the ink and needle when his hair was no longer reeking. Since this had clearly become some sort of game, Remus ran for his integrity.


	7. Chapter 7

The Mischief Managers

Chapter 7: The Museum of Relics

Air, wonderful air. Reggie heaved himself out of the janitor's lavatory, his hands slipping on the dirty wet ring several times. If only Bella or someone would give him a glove, but they all had their backs turned, discussing the dismantling of the protective webs in the Museum of Relics and drying their masks on their robes.

"How dumb can you be?" Bella asked, still dripping as she went to dismantle some security charms just outside the door. "To set up the root charms by a toilet?"

"It was more difficult to open the lid" Lucius agreed and spat on his mask to give it just a little more shine. "It was so dirty it had gotten stuck. I would have drowned for sure, had I not kept my dearest in mind"

A sentimental gaze swept across his face and a nauseaus one across Bella's.

"Blegh just shut up will you?"

"You're just jealous because gentlemen prefer blondes"  
Lucius pulled the mask over his face and let the elastic ribbon snap him in the back.

"I'm engaged to a very wicked French baker, so _there._ Everybody knows that that's where the wicked romantic gentlemen are at. Oh, he's so beautiful and pure... My parents don't like him much, 'though, but who cares when you're in wicked love?"

"What's not to like, if he's pure and rich?"

"He's not my brother"

"But you don't have a brother"

"I _know!"_ "  
Reggie rolled over the ring and could not avoid landing in a puddle. He pocketed his travelling rime and adjusted his Junior Eater mask. It felt so humid under it and he couldn't understand why they didn't have mouth holes.

As a Junior Eater, Reggie had been allowed to come along for the experience. While Snape was already a Death Eater postulant as well, Reggie had to wait another year before he could apply to the big club. After carefully considering all the wicked Orders, Reggie had decided that the Death Eaters were right for him, for they were large, growing, and there he had a chance at making it on his own merits.

"So is it safe now?" he asked, getting up, dripping like a waterfall.

"Dismantling the protective webs was as easy as taking candy from Dumbledore, little one" said Bella.

"That's actually really difficult" said Snape.

"Oh really? It was easy in my days, when he still taught Charms. How was he ever made Headmaster, when he can't even hold on to his lemon sherbert?"

"Didn't you go to Baguette Maguique Academy?" Reggie asked.

"No"

"Why not?"

"Because they can't handle a little energy, that's why"

"Alright let's just get this over with" said Lucius and joined Bella over the treshold. "I do want to want to be rested for the Matiné tomorrow"

The four of them took the stairs to the ground floor, dismantling security charms as necessary. The Master's Ring sat on a velvet cushion in a glass case in the relic hall. Lucius hauled out his snake cane and began to lift the protective charms.

"Have you covered charm dismantling in class yet?" he asked in a low voice.

"No" Reggie replied.

"But I have done it" said Snape.

"You _haven't?"_ said Lucius.

"What did I say" said Bella, assisting in the dismantling. "Don't make somebody the Headmaster that you can take sweets from"

"Oh dear, oh dear" said Lucius. "Hogwarts used to be a respected school, but it's turned into a joke. They are so afraid of turning their students into criminals that they can't teach anything useful. The founders wanted it to be for nobility only. Now they are so desperate they owl anybody as soon as they turn eleven, even if they are muggles and squibs"

"And other things" said Snape.

"My letter got lost in the mail and they literally knocked down our door over it" Reggie recalled. "Mother had to destroy a very valuable rug that ate mudblood feet because a half-breed stepped on it. She could have bought a new one because father is an attorney and he sued the school for half it's worth because it was Christmas. But, you know, 'It was 400 years old!'"

The dismantling was close to finished when Reggie thought he could hear a squeaking trolley. Turning, he saw the janitor on wobbly legs transporting cleaning stuff in the middle of the night and whispered to the others to look. The old man posed no real threat, not only because he was clearly drunk but also because, being a janitor, he was most likely also a squib.

"Also, left handed, judging from the position of the items" said Reggie.

"Also, dead, judging by my wand pointing at the dumb look on his face" said Bella, her wand raised to kill. " _Avada Keda-"_

"We've been through this" said Lucius and pushed her wand down. "That attracts unnecessary attention. We don't actually need to kill anything if it's not a muggle"  
"But it's _just_ a janitor"

"You know the green light attracts snooping orphans like light attracts moths"

"Fine. _Jellify!"_

The jellify beam hit a glass case with an ancient sword and turned it all to jelly. A rubber chicken soared over their heads, knocked out the janitor and returned to the colonnade that separated the relic hall from the foyer before they even noticed it.

"Who's there?" Lucius asked.

The colonnade pillars giggled.

" _Knock knock!"_ they yelled.

"I _just_ asked: who's there?"

" _Juno!"  
_ "Juno who- damn it"

" _Ha ha ha he said You-Know-Who!"_

"For Goat's sake let's just kill them so I can go home and watch telly already" said Bella.

Butts exposed themselves beside the pillars, each baring a tattoo of a butt framed by a tapeworm forming a double M.

"Very funny" said Bella, not shocked from offence for very long.

"Look!" said Lucius and pointed up at a large mark hanging mid-air, identical to the tattoos. It was all very upsetting.

"Stop stalling!" Bella yelled and went to the colonnade, where multiple jets of some sort of liquid burnt holes in her mask and made her cry from pain. The culprits rolled on roller skates from the pillars and across the main relic room in butt masks and formal shorts with briefcases bearing what had to be their name; The Mischief Managers _._ They squirted acid jets in all directions and were so quick on the wheels that they were easy to miss, especially because there were so many podiums and pillars to hide behind.

"Misman Springroll!" came the first, snared Lucius with extendable finger traps while he was shocked from being burnt in the face by acid, and smashed him into a class case where he passed out in a puddle of shards.

"Misman Eggnog!" came the second and knocked out Bella with a rubber chicken while she had her back turned aiming at another Misman. "Kung P _ow!"_

A Misman Macadamia unleashed a can of bubble gum boa constrictors on Snape, one of which swallowed him whole. As the last one standing, Reggie was just about to fire away at an inactive Misman who just hung around trembling in a boob apron when a sharp pain hit the back of his head and everything went black.

James removed his mask to breathe. Then he squatted by one of the Death Eaters and doodled the Misman insignia on his mask, just to give the aurors and press something to talk about.

"Why didn't you introduce yourself?" he asked Peter.

"Because" said Peter "I don't want to be Clotted Cream, or Sour Milk"

Sirius also bent down to scribble on a Death Eater mask.

"Low Fat was my favourite, because it's ironic. _Ow!_ "

Sirius winced, because Remus could pinch really hard.

"I wish there had been more of them" said James, capping his pen now. "Because I am in love with your catch phrases"

"There's plenty more where those came from" said Sirius, tapping himself on the crack.

Auror sirens rang in the distance, alerting the criminals that they were coming to get them. The boys wanted to get out of the museum before they arrived, to maintain an air of mystery.

"Ok Moo have you signed yours?" James asked.

"Yes" Remus replied downbeat.

"You sound downbeat"

"Well, I was violated today. It's going to take a while to get over that"

"I was violated today too so I can sympathise" said Sirius, sighing over scorched follicles.

"I guess you're even then" said James.

"Well I don't know. The back of my head looks a litte weird now"

"The back of my my butt looks a little weird now!" Remus snapped.

"Guys let's just get smashed when we get back" said James. "That always speeds up the forgiving process"

"We're already on that" said Sirius, sharing a bottle of rum with Remus and soon enough they were whispering and giggling. Then he signed an as of yet unsigned Death Eater and zapped him from the building.

"Double Gloucester. That was a good one too"

"I like Latte best" said James. "Let's go with Latte"

It was agreed that Peter was to be known as Misman Latte. Hearing the aurors coming, the boys ran up the stairs to the janitor office, climbed up on the roof from a window and just posed on the roof for a minute before they got back inside and escaped through the lavatory.


	8. Chapter 8

The Mischief Managers

Chapter 8: Wendigos

The incident at the museum took up several pages in the newspapers. The boys found a discrete corner to gloat in private before class.

"Just look at all the headlines!" said James. "Mysterious superheroes stop museum theft!' 'Just who are the Mischief Managers?' 'What's the deal with EggMac? Ask a Japanese expert!' _'It is so touchingly unconditional and disturbingly dysfunctional, explains yaoi consult Kyoko Koko_.' Yes, but how does she know that?"

"That is too many adverbs this early in the morning" Remus yawned. "I think the classroom just opened"  
"Hold on the meeting isn't over"

"Meeting?"

James tossed the news in the bin. Sirius dived after it.

"Hey I wanted the crosswords they have a super special"

"Padfoot" said James. "Last night I couldn't help but notice you relocating one of the burglars"

"Did you try? _'_ You don't want to meet one of these when it's hungry _.',_ 7 letters"

"It just seemed a little risky"

"Aren't we doing risky? I-"

"Now they'll ask themselves why one got away. People who are underage are probably just let off with a warning anyway, and getting caught might even put him off"  
"Has getting caught ever put you off?"

"That's different. We're different"

"Has it ever put Moony off?"

That was a ver fair point. "The occasional detention is hardly comparable"  
"Besides, put him off what? The sense of purpose and belonging? I'm not trying to run anybody's life, I just don't want to be thought of as an enemy. S. That actually fits"

That was perhaps very sweet but James still found his original point valid and certainly more objective. Furthermore he didn't want the Mismen to be just a one time gag.

"If you don't want to be thought of as an enemy you really picked the wrong pastime. I still think it was unnecessary but maybe it's just me that doesn't want to risk a serious non-profit organisiation over some personal conflict..."

He glanced at Remus in hope for support but he was just doing his homework on the floor now.

"Serious? We're wearing buttmasks" he said.

"Sometimes you shock me"

"There are other things to do to not be thought of as an enemy that might be worth a shot, 'though"

"Oh yeah what?"

" _Talking"_

That made sense, although in a boring way. Communication really was the problem to be answered.

"There you hear?" James asked Sirius. "You've got to learn to open up, mate! You've got to tell him how you _feel!"_

"You are so right and I love you for it" said Sirius, also sitting down now to do the puzzle on the floor instead of the wall.

"What are you, drunk? How dare you get pissed without me?"

Remus was putting away his homework now. Class had just started, after all.  
"I don't really advocate drinking" he said. "But if opening up is so difficult, maybe a before-a-presentation measure could help, just to still the nerves"

This rather uncharacteristic piece of advice raised some interesting questions.

"Do you get pissed before presentations?" James asked.

" _No!_ I've just heard that some do. OK, once or twice"

"Just why would you get pissed on your own before presentations when you know we love getting pissed too?" Sirius asked.

"It's _not_ 'getting pissed'"

"Well, well, thet cat's out of the bag. It's always a presentation somewhere, right? Whatelse do you do? Do you get high before PE too?"

"That would explain everything" said James.

"This is about you" said Remus. "You're communication issues and intimacy issues"

"Oh" said Sirius, as both rose to their feet now. "So you can throw stones in glasshouses all you want but the rest of us can't?"

"Shifting focus is _really_ proving how you don't have issues"

"You're the one who stocks up on paper bags, not me"

"You do every substance under the sun because you're so obsessed with manipulating your mind"  
"You would, too, if you didn't cherish your un-manipulated mind so much"

Watching them refuse be the first to raise their voice would have gone well with popcorn. They had already proven time and time again for how many eternities they could keep an argument going, but they really had to go to class now lest they were locked out.

"Alright then" said Professor Olivier upbeat when the boys had sat down at their usual place and picked up a blackboard chalk playfully. "Today's topic is immunity, right? Small creatures have small immunity, and large creatures have large immunity, yeah, it's all pretty basic, alright? Good"

He wrote that down, although not even the textbooks over simplified it so much. Professor Olivier was a rarity, because he was so likable. Sure, somehow he made everything about roasted turkeys, but he had a point; if you ran into zombies and had to cast a ring of fire at them, why not roast a turkey in it while you were at it?

"Giant creatures require a lot of strong men to take it down, yeah?" Professor Olivier went on. "Wendigos, now, they require very powerful magic, see? Wendigos are very big eaters, like, we're talking Christmas, Thanksgiving, big, big turkeys! Except in their case, big, big humans! You all know the level three fire spell that you learned last year. It's all really basic. Position, body, arm. _Brown Dwarf!_ Woosh, just watch it go, lovely! Do a little twirl if you must, just to give it a kick, and then..."

Professor Olivier opened his desk drawer and took out a perfectly cooked turkey and let it get a roasted surface in the residual heat from the fire charm.

"Look at that! Lovely!"

He put the turkey back in the drawer. The classroom smelled like roasted turkey now, why did he have to do that to them? Vegetarians prayed for strength.

"Now, then. The stronger immunity, the higher level fire charm required, like, meringues are sensitive and need low temperature, they are the ghosts of the dark creature world, too much heat and they'll just BOOM explode! But wendigos, they're the turkeys! Strong, even heat exposure, and for quite a long time! You can't just defeat a wendigo with a quick one, you got a get in there, just give it a real smack, just like that, think habanero, or any of the strongest peppers! Alright, so let's just start going over level 4: the Red Dwarf. Now, the Red Dwarf is like one oven on maximum heat. To take down a wendigo you'd need about six ovens for it to cook through. But if you're alone, that's fine, just scorch the horns and you'll see, it will let you run away for now and they''ll get a nice crispy edge. I like to use the level 4 for wendigos, giants, barbecues, smack! En flambés! Is that how you pluralise that? What else? Turkeys..."

He sure could go on talking forever. When he was done listing foods he gave the recipe for suitable sandwiches to pack for wendigo hunts, emphasising the importance of protein and always giving vegetarian alternatives.

"...And lots of mayonnaise. Mm, lovely! And you'll see, that just that sprig of rosemary..."

And the strangest thing was perhaps, although it wasn't all that strange, it was all so interesting and inspiring!

"...And just WAM bam, thank you mam! Those flavours, like the kisses of angels. Ok, so that's that. Just do questions from the book. I'll be right here"

And that really was that. Without actually demonstrating the level 4 fire charm Professor Olivier just picked up a cook book.

"Let's ask him if we can go to the library" said James.

Professor Olivier gave the boys his permission, and they could now go and spend the rest of the class in the dummy room further down the hall to scorch some fire proof dummies. The dummy room had been closed for as long as they knew, a decision that had followed the untimely death of a student many years ago. Thanks to this very few knew of the place today and it was always empty.

"We should re-do the bubble potion" said Sirius while White Dwarfs bubbled out of his palms. "Except instead of giving it bubble qualities we should give it immunity qualities"

"Ok why not" said James and let an orange fire beam scorch a dummy to dust before Sirius could hit it. "Should be really easy to just follow the same recipe. But do we really need all modifiers?"

"Better safe than sorry. Do you have the recipe on you?"

A White Dwarf crashed with a Supernova, causing an explosion so bright and large it forced the boys to hide under their fireproof hoods.

"Thankfully I forgot my stuff in the classroom" said Remus, poking the ashy remnants of a feather. This wasn't an ideal place to practice levitation charms, so Peter went to the library instead.

"Let's get the stuff we need, then" said James and blew out his flaming finger tips.

"Don't you want to stay for the full hour?" Sirius asked. "You know that everything they mention always turns up somehow in some dramatic twist of events, so I'm very excited"

"Don't get too excited. No one's ever seen a wendigo in Hogsmead, they're too exotic"

"That's what they've said about many things that have later come to infest the place due to some loony's evil plan"

"Maybe, but they'd be difficult to import"

Scorching dummies was still fun enough and worthy hanging around for. They spent over an hour or so on scorching dummies, both showing off the levels they mastered and pushing themselves to master the next one, forgetting all about the time until they were already late for potions class.

The potions assignment served to further fuel Sirius's optimism and even James dared to believe again for they were to make their very own wendigo antidote. The ingredients and measurements were written on the blackboard and the instructions in the book were to be followed. Since the potion contained among other things two black widows (spiders) and a newborn rat, ingredients that weren't easily converted to vegan alternatives since their living qualities were essential for the desired results, Remus packed up to brew something in the other lab. In the past he hadn't even been allowed to stay in the dungeons, but since he had been feeling so angry and predatorial lately, Slughorn was afraid to argue.

Yes, Slughorn was a wuss but it was understandable if people didn't quite know what to believe half the time, James thought, especially if they had never tattooed anybody angry and predatorial and lived to find they had to take their own notes for now on. It didn't perhaps sound so bad, but taking notes was tedious. Copying notes was quick and easy. When you were used to just copying notes that just knew better than you what was going to pop up on exams and what wasn't, taking your own notes was tedious and they were always either too wordy or too short, too detailed when it wasn't necessary, or not detailed enough and too confusing.

"Now see that's the way to do it" said Sirius, measuring six cups of black widows which kept crawling out of the measuring cup. "Do you think my neck is too thin? Maybe they like them really fat!"

"How should I know?" said James, backing away from the spiders with a newborn rat on his chopping board, tempted to become vegan just to get out. Sirius collected the excess spiders that were crawling allover the desk and put them back in the giant jar. One crawled over his face and he couldn't have been more unbothered. Having cake shoved in his face trauamtised him more. It was weird and unnatural, there was no other way of putting it.

"How come you aren't naturally suspicious towards anything with more than two legs like healthy people?" James asked.

Sirius just zoned out, obviously having a private flashback. When he returned from it he seemed more melancholic. James wasn't sure he wanted to know this backstory, if it involved sentimental spider memories.

"My gran had a spider farm" Sirius began.

"Ok"

If James didn't sound interested, Sirius wouldn't go on, he thought.

"She would breed them and really fatten them up-"

"Ugh-"

"-until they were big as cats. I would play with them, and one of them even became one of my first pets. I named her Tickles and I even made a leash for her and would take her on walks. Then I learned that my gran would kill female black widows once they had eaten their mate and turn them to preserves, so I hid Tickles in my room from then on. But somehow my room became full of spider eggs. My mum saw this and the stupid bitch ratted me out. Tickles was taken from me and my gran was put in a wicked home, where she died recently"

James couldn't help but stare, utterly disgusted.

"You made a _leash_ for a spider?"

"I was four, I never thought to consider its feelings"

"What?"

"Today I'd never force a leash on anything"  
"Ok, enough spiders. I'm sorry about your gran. Was she old?"

"Yeah pretty old she was 50"

"When she was put in a home?"

"No when she died, she was, what, 43 when she was put in a home. No spring chicken then either"

" _My_ mum is 49"

"Oh. Live and let live, that's my motto"

"Was she sick?"

"Very. It's what eventually killed her. When she was 18 or something she committed a series of squib murders. At 50 she was caught and executed because my dad found out she had been using his hairbrush"

"You know we agreed no tall tales unless it's April Fools"

"It's true he's very petty"

They commenced with their potions without running into any major difficulties and finished on time. Slughorn stopped by on his judging round, gave them top marks and then it was time to clean up. Little by little the students escaped the dungeons and soon the immunity potion could begin. Remus returned from the other lab to participate.

Immunity potions weren't exactly unheard of and there were many, many recipes to choose from, each of them promising no decrease in magic level.

"I wonder of The Cape uses an immunity potion" said Peter.

Well, he had to, he wasn't that quick on his Major Tom (that wasn't a euphemism.) In any case, the boys weren't following any traditional recipe, for if any of them delivered what they promised, that would have been a national sensation. Nor were they prepared to brew a darker variety, for although they were more prone to deliver, they were also very prone to come at a very high cost. No, they had already decided they were redoing the bubble gum potion, but the question was, what could they add that would grant them magic immunity?

Remus had the recipe out and they followed it to the point where it was time to add modifiers.

"Immunity..." said James. "Come on, think!"  
"Something immortal..." Sirius thought.

"But immortality is evil!"

"I know!" said Remus. "Helmets!"

Well, it wasn't as if anybody else had a better suggestion, or any suggestion at all that didn't relate to immortality. And immortality was evil. And it so happened that Remus had a motorcross helmet in his bag, in case something wanted to eat his brain, or snog his soul out. Some witches liked them hard to get, too.

The motorcross helmet needed to be cut to pieces to fit in the small cauldron, and once it had been added, all that was left to do was to wait.


	9. Chapter 9

The Mischief Managers

Chapter 9: The French Mafia

It took over ten days but the Immunity Potion worked, it was finished and it worked! Such a potion would make the news had it not needed to be kept in secrecy like so many other ingenious creations that only the boys knew of. From then on they spent most of their free time in the dummy room, hauling high level fire magic at each other without scorching a hair by day, and fighting criminals by night.

Now they were proper superheroes again in a world that so cried for justice everyday. Everyday the news spoke of their great deeds, speculated about their identities and asked when and where they'd be sighted next.

The boys were in the dummy room again. It was some time after lunch and they had some twenty minutes to spare. It was more important than ever to stay in magical offence form, in spite of their immunity potion and gadgets.

"Remember that article from this morning" said James and scorched through a row of dummies so they reeked from their holes. "'Several muggles cooked to death in giant ratatouille. Aurors suspect cannibalistic chefs.'"

"There is no meat in ratatouille" said Sirius, determined to set an even longer trail of dummies ablaze with a string of White Dwarfs just to show off. James scorched yet another row in half.. Wendigos and Death Eaters were never so many, still and standing in neat lines like this, that was the only problem.

"They left a message signed by the French Mafia, Tojours Fromage. The aurors think they might be able to verify that it was a ratatouille, so I guess we'll see"

All the dummies had been scorched to ashes now. The boys watched them rise from their ashy remains like phoenixes.

"That's very reminiscent of that article from the other day" said Remus. "'Several muggles drowned in brie mass. Aurors suspect cannibalistic cheesemakers.'"

His eyes were in white and blue flames like a fancy dessert. Following being tied up in the druid kitchen weeks ago he had decided to prepare himself for the possibility of that happening again, even though the chances were miniscule. A bit extremely paranoid, sure, as well as advanced and therefore also very exhausting and requiring several long pauses, like all magic did in the beginning. But it looked cool, even when only little veil like flames would manifest.

"Cannibals are pretty disturbing" said James and gave Sirius a good scorching, which left him temporarily blinded because he hadn't looked away quickly enough but he was otherwise unharmed.

"They cook their victims" said Remus.

"I know. I wonder if all cannibals do, or if it's a French thing"  
"I just think it's a funny coincidence since our theme is food"

"Or, is it irony?" Sirius asked.

"I'm pretty sure it's just coincidence"  
"I'm pretty sure you're just refusing to use the word 'irony' because you're afraid of using it wrong"

Instead of dignifying that with an answer, Remus blinked away the flames and sat down to recharge.

"If our theme is food and they cook food" said James. "That means we just might have our very first arch-nemesissys! But just what do we do with this information?"  
Although they had so longed for their true hero's first nemesis, it was probably most likely a coincidence. But what a wonderfully romantic coincidence at that, 'though.

The boys fought amongst eachother for another twenty minutes until James's sleeve caught on fire. He slapped it out and decided it was time for a refill, and Sirius thought it couldn't hurt.

"Don't drink too much and too often, 'though" said Remus.

"We're _not"_ said James, chugging away.

"It's important to refill before the immunity is gone" Sirius pointed out. "Ok that should give me another three hours"

And then they began to duel was a known fact that immunity potions could cause all sorts of problems, and who knew what sort of sideffect an improvised potion could have? But among the known and common side effects was, aside from weakened magic, an immunity to the potion itself.

Most potions didn't taste very good so it wasn't very hard to not drink more than the required minimum, but that helmet had really done something with those flavours.

Diced onion sizzled in a pan in the posh little bakery in Little Paris, Hogsmead, not to be confused with Little France, Diagon Alley. The wicked French sorcier nobility, they had truly been taking over unnoticably and were influencing all fields of society with their wicked ways while the common ignorant man just blamed the Romanians. Rod was pleased. Pleased with the scapegoats and the sizzling onions and especially with being a wicked Frenchman. Never was he going to change his name for 'integration purposes' like the Grand Sorcier!

"The Mischief Managers, pleh!" Rab spat, uncorking a Riesling. "They think they can insult the Dark Lord and get away with it! You mess with the Death Eaters you mess with Tojours Fromage as well!"

"I wouldn't worry about them" said Rod. "By the sound of it, they're just children. Possibly orphans snooping for the aurors but underage nonetheless, and no match for experienced Dark Wizards in any dark struggle. Now let's just get on with our work. I have tickets to Jesus Christ Superstar"

Tonight's victim sat tied to a chair, terror in his eyes for beside him was a vibrating meat grinder. The timer rang and Rab took out the prebaked pie shells. Rod took the onions from the hot stove, sipped on his Chardonnay and went to the victim with a meat knife.

Without further stalling or snide exposition to give snooping orphans time to intervene, he cut the man's arm off and let the grinder eat it up. The man cried from utter despair and pain but Rod was unmoved and kept cutting off parts and sticking them in the grinder. After many minutes of heavy bleeding the shrieks subsided as the man died from exsanguination.

"Disgusting" said Rod about the blood stains on his apron and removed it. "Is the stew done?"

"Almost" Rab replied and added the Riesling to the onions and cream, stirred for a few seconds and grabbed a chunk of meat from the grinder to add to the stew. The entire mixture went in the pie shells and the pies were covered with grated cheese before going in the oven.

"The homeless are in for a treat at the soup kitchen tomorrow" said Rod and refilled his Chardonnay, really looking forward to see Jesus Christ Superstar tonight.

"Except for the vegetarians" said Rab.

"That's where you're wrong for we will say it is soy"  
Both laughed at their wicked scheme to trick vegetarians into eating meat and refilled their wine for a toast.


	10. Chapter 10

The Mischief Managers

Chapter 10: The New Roller Rink

The portal to Hogsmead was closed. The news reported of a wendigo infestation and nobody was allowed to leave Hogwarts until the situation was under control. Never before had the quiet village so called for super intervention, and it was just typical that the boys had to be confined like damsels themselves.

As for the Roofie Potion, it became a source of comfort. Last night Remus had just left it in the lab, forgetting to protect it from the mysterious potion saboteur. Upon remembering this the next day he had thought that he would have to start over _again._ But as it turned out, he couldn't have been more wrong. When he found the potion it was done, finito, complete, just perfect and fulfilling all criterias for the optimal Roofie Potion in just about every way as if a potion saviour had heard his silent midnight omnitheist prayers and answered them. Analysing a sample through a microscope only revealed perfection on a microscopic level and there was no trace of gummy bears or poison and nothing frowned.

"Who just who would do this?" he asked, wondering if there had been some sort of mistake, if some intentional or accidental swapping had taken place.

"Maybe you've just had the ability all this time" said James. "Inside"

Yesterday the potion had smelled like bubble gum and aquariums but today it smelled like slugs and aspic so somebody had definitely picked up on the problem and fixed it, and to do that the person would have had to know the intentions.

"Oh look, a post it" said Sirius and took the post it from the cauldron. "'2'."

It didn't matter that a mysterious grader had joined the crowd of mysterious weirdos, the potion was finished and ready to be administered. Remus filled a vial.

"How does this work anyway? If I give this to Slughorn, who will he fall in lust with?"

"With you" said Sirius.

"But what if I don't want that?"

"Fine, give it to me"

"Why, what will you do?"

"Take care of everything"

"What do you mean by that?"

"Why are you always so suspicious I thought you didn't want to be collected. All I'm going to do is add this sample that I took from Professor McGonagall's cup this morning"

Sirius whipped out a swab that he kept in a ziplock bag from his robes. McGonagall was going to be so annoyed, and the more annoyed the better. He stuck the swab in the vial and the stinging aroma of a single malt mixed with Walker's shortbread joined the former aromas. It was time for the next step.

The teachers and prefects seemed to be everywhere today although it was Sunday, all to keep people from sneaking out of Hogwarts. When finally the immediate area around the bronze witch with the huge arse was safe the boys hurried as fast as they could.

"What the hell did we have to say?" James asked. "All I remember is that it was something weird and that it was really hard to guess"

"Open Sesame" said Sirius and the large cheeks parted. "I think it was written down somewhere, actually"

"Yeah that sounds more likely"

"McGonagall's coming" said Remus.

Sirius closed the opening and the boys leaned casually against the bronze witch, just looking bored.

"Good afternoon" said Professor McGonagall. "Why do I always find you here?"

"I don't think you always find us here" said James.

Hopefully McGonagall would just carry on, like she did most of the time. But on occasion she would engage in casual conversation or angry lectures, not rarely at a really bad time.

"Do you know who that is?" McGonagall asked. This was nice, her not yelling and taking points but did she have to chat just _now_ and _here?_ Sometimes, when she was particularly talky, it was as if she just did it because she _knew_ she was most likely hindering them to do something.

"Yeah it's Brunhilda it says so" said Sirius.

"Brunhilda Smith is an ancestor to Professor Sprout. She created this statue as a means of remaining young and beautiful forever while the statue took all the old and ugly, you know like In The Picture of Dorian Gray. She crafted many items of great power, like the Master's Ring for example. That was the last thing she ever made before she gave up the Dark Arts forever to teach defence here, which she did for many, many years."

The boys nodded, showing polite interest and just really wanting to get out already. Didn't she have exams to correct or something?

"Some weather we're having" said McGonagall about today's unremarkable weather. Partial cloudiness and soft winds was really the most unremarkable that weather could be.

"What's the Master's Ring?" James asked.

"It's a ring that controls wendigos" said McGonagall. "Some coincidence, first that attempted theft at the Museum of Relics and now wendigos have been sighted in Hogsmead for the first time in several hundred years"

Some students passed and McGonagall bid them a good day as well. She had hung around for so long she really was trying to hinder their whatever, that should have been obvious from the beginning.

"Hey, do you want me to tell you about the Order of Merlin? I'm a grade 3 member, you know"

"Sure what was he like?" Sirius asked.

"Scaly. You know, because I'm a dinosaur"

"No one's saying that. I think you're beautiful"

"Oh, that is so sweet of you to say that" replied McGonagall, not scared off that easily but this time she didn't award any points. Slughorn was coming their way with flowers and she didn't notice until he spoke in her ear.

"Minerva" he whispered, his pupils being glowing little hearts. McGonagall actually jumped a little.

"Yes what is it?"

"Do you want to have dinner with me tonight?"

"I'm having dinner with the Headmaster"

Slughorn's face became dark anger.

"But you always have dinner with the Headmaster, it's like you're a thing! Gay best friend my backside!"

He threw the flowers on the floor, upset by his own sudden onset of jealousy.

"What does he have that I don't?" he asked, tears running from his eyes.

McGonagall sighed, annoyed that she would have to go and deal with Slughorn's amorous emotions and thusly be unable to watch the boys like a hawk for a couple of minutes, and the boys, they disappeared through Brunhilda as soon as McGonagall's back was turned.

The streets of Hogsmead were cold and empty because the public had been warned about the wendigo danger and were adviced to stay indoors unless they absolutely had to go out. These agoraphobic wendigos who only came out at night were truly boring and the boys were seriously beginning to suffer show-offery withdrawal symptoms.

"Yeah you stay away!" said James, shaking a fist at nobody.

"This is where they were sighted so why aren't they here now?" Sirius asked, very annoyed.

"Maybe they know _wen-to-go"_ said Remus.

"Don't make puns"

"You do it all the time"

"This isn't a time for jokes try to be more wary!"

Not that there was any reason to be wary at such a dull and eventless street as this. The festively decorated shopping windows offered some comfort because Halloween was just better than Christmas. The boys looked at the same carved pumpkins and decorative skeletons that were always put up in all the windows this time of year. One house in the line was empty, and it had a sign at the door:

 _New rink opens on Halloween! Come dressed as your favourite terror on wheels! Free entrance for all! It's going to be scary awesome! Note: you must be at least sixteen._

Sirius wasn't too bothered by the age line, for his fake ID's had never failed him. However, he wasn't very impressed with the overuse of exclamation marks.

"Don't tell me what is awesome I decide what is awesome" he muttered.

"We should go!" said James, actually excited although he didn't roller skate much. "What should our theme be? And can we try to not crossdress for once?"

"But I wanted to go as Joan of Arc"

"We dressed up as burning witches last year"

"Then how about something fairy tale related?"

"That's always fun and recognisable. All in favour of The Three Little Piggies on wheels?"

James put up his hand and so did Sirius but the response was otherwise not extremely enthusiastic.

"We can never have a majority" said Sirius. "Let's invite Fletch, I bet he'd be up for anything where mud would add to his costume"

"You always want Fletch to be part of everything why don't you just marry him!"

"Because he doesn't shower!"

Poor Fletch, just what terrible house boat accident could have caused his severe hydrophobia? It was a secret he wouldn't even share with therapists, and Sirius had tried to trick him into seeing a few.  
"The sign said: Come as your favourite _terror_ on wheels" said Remus.

" _Were-_ piggies" James clarified.

"Also nobody was going to make you a piggie" said Sirius.

It was late and cold and there was no wendigo in sight, so the boys decided to call it an utter disappointment and just cut across the cemetery. When they reached the firestation that they were taking to their commonroom, they heard voices further down the road and they hid on instinct so they could listen without being seen.

" _Are you sure you know where that homeless shelter is?"_ came one voice.

" _I looked it up on Googlus's Ancient Maps, trust me, it 's just down there. 112 Bumstreet"_

 _"I hope you know this place because I have never set foot here, and hope to never have to again"_

 _"Me too. Let's just deliver these human meat pies"_

The two wizards disappeared out of sight, and their conversation with them.

"I wonder" said James. "Are they they of the French Mafia from the newspapers? And the masked wizards that tied us up in the druid house?"

"They're serving meat pies at a vegetarian homeless shelter they have to be stopped!" said Remus.

"Oh come on, beggars can't be choosers" said Sirius, just not seeing comic book action potential in a soup kitchen. Batman didn't fight bad guys at soup kitchens? Or did he? Sirius hadn't actually read those comics. Meanwhile, Remus's face was becoming darker, and darker... and darker...

"Never mind that" Sirius said, to spare his nose and teeth, and maybe neck, too, "just as long you don't want to involve aurors and also cannibalism just isn't cool"

That lightened his face a bit, and Sirius wondered when he had last checked his Phase Book. Wasn't there going to be a Blue Moon or something sometime soon, or was that in November?

The boys switched into their super-shorts with a spin, had a quick Immunity sip to be safe and roller skated off to the vegetarian homeless shelter. The two wizards were giving the box of meat pies to a stocky middle aged woman who worked at the shelter, and she wept at the sight.

"Such kindness, such generosity!"

"It's nothing, Mrs. Bonnuit, honestly!" said the wizards, acting bashful. "The least we can do!"

Sirius tried to jellify them, but his wand just made a car enging fail sound. Some sparks would emit, but it wasn't enough to jellify a finger nail. James seemed to have the same problem. Remus could still produce bubble gum, but not with the usual ease and shade. With Peter it was difficult to tell, his wand always made the car engine fail sound.

Sick of this, Sirius flung his chicken at one wizard, and James strangled the other with his finger traps. Both sunk to their knees and passed out. Mrs. Bonnuit looked horrified.

"How could you do such a thing?!" she cried, hysterical.

As for the homeless people, they looked pretty astounded themselves, and several asked if these boys in the butt masks weren't the celebrated young superheroes from the news, and how they could have such cold hearts.

"They're meat pies" James explained to them.

"So what beggars can't be choosers!" Mrs. Bonnuit rebuffed.

The homeless men and women glowered at her, and she became nervous, as if she thought they'd give her fleas.

"Ha ha of course those aren't meat pies, I mean. Why would you think that?"

"That's what they said" said James.

"Well you must have heard wrong. But there is only one way to settle this, and then you will feel like such fools"

Mrs. Bonnuit began to look through the box, and was just about to take out one of the pies for analysis when Remus, after having given his willow, sphinx molar a few slaps, scorched the box to dust. Then he rolled out of the shelter, with Peter rolling after.

Well, they had done what they came for, so there was really no reason to hang around and be chastised by the staff, if not to watch some of Mrs. Bonnuit's hair turn green as she tended to the knocked-out, and brought them back to consciousness. Of course.

"How do you feel, baby?" Bella asked her future brother-in-law and caressed his face.

"Great!" Rab replied.

"Hello?" said Rod, annoyed at this.

"Hi" said Bella, still caressing the brother. She did so for another minute, until she remember. "Wait... I got it wrong _again!_ You and your twin-tricks!"

"We're not twins!"

"Hey they're getting away!"

James and Sirius hadn't even moved, but now they had to roll from cascades of dark spells, that of course didn't burn a hair on their heads since they were immune still, thankfully. They found Remus and Peter outside the rink, talking to a pair of _aurors_ with coffee and donuts in their hands,

"Wait" said an auror, "You summoned us because they're serving meat at a homeless shelter?"

"Don't I recognise you from the papers?" asked the other.

Sirius knocked them both out with his chicken. "What _the hell?!"  
_ "What?" Remus asked.

"What was all that before? I thought you had realised at last that aurors are useless"

"I never said that. And besides, maybe we're being too cynical. After all, they're very understaffed. It must be miserable, to be so unappreciated"

Mood swings and delusions. What day was it, again? It was too cloudy to tell, but there was definitely something glowing in the sky, but it was still a crescent.

"If they're understaffed they need less work" said James.

There was a truth to that. Perhaps they had judged aurors too harshly, for relying on free child labour so much. The boys could hear the Death Eaters panting as they caught up, and now they were in their masks. One of them had put on the wrong mask and needed to stop for a minute to change.

"There's a ladder over there!" said James, running down an alley beside Tom's Foolery and the boys began to climb to the roof, which was difficult to do in wheels.

The Death Eaters were after them in seconds, and instead of taking the ladder, they apparated to the roof where they waited for the boys to catch up before they began to cast their dark curses.

But the boys couldn't care less. Sirius began to throw his chicken hither and dither, knocking them off the buildning one by one until a Death Eater held on to it and they began to tug at a side each. Sirius squirted acid at his bare neck so he screamed and toppled away.

"Don't _pullet!"_

 _"Oh!"_ said James, ensnaring dark wizards and tossing them off the roof effortlessly. "I am out of catch phrases!"

"Bok bok bok choy!" said Sirius, hitting yet another bad guy in the head.

"Stick to your own theme!"

In other parts of the roof bubble gum snakes were eating dark wizards whole and even Peter dared to use his acid marigold on those who came too close.

More Death Eaters kept appearing, and they quickly learned that their magic had no effect whatsoever. One of them armlocked Peter from behind and threatened to throw him off the roof.

"Nobody moves, or fatty gets it!" he said."Just hand over the immunity potion"

"Never!" Sirius retorted, raising his chicken.

"Hang on" said James. "Maybe we should let them have the potion"

"Oh _alright!"_ Sirius reached down his shorts pocket and took out the little vial, that had such few drops left. Another Death Eater came forth to get it, but Sirius just threw it at Peter's head, thereby knocking him out.

" _What was that?"_ James asked.

"They won't throw him off the roof if he's already passed out, will they? Pointless"

It was true. The Death Eater that had held Peter in armlock realised his great unimportance and let go of him. Peter folded over himself like a blanket. He was bleeding from his forehead, but it was a superficial cut that didn't need immediate care.

"See?" said Sirius.

A Death Eater raised his wand, and he pointed it at Remus. A jet of blood red light struck him in the chest and he fell, cramping from the pain. Sirius flung the chicken at the Deat Eater so he cracked his skull on a chimney while James helped Remus down a rainwater pipe. Peter had regained consciousness on his own and followed them down from the roof, doing pretty well protecting himself with acid jets, and then Sirius was alone on the rooftop, and wondered why his chicken hadn't returned to him.

"Well, well, well" said a Death Eater, weighing the chicken in his hand. "Defeated. By your own gadget"

He was just about to fling the ficken at Sirius when an empty can of snake nuts hit his head and knocked him out. The chicken and the can fell down to the ground. Sirius stared at the items, and so did the remaining Death Eaters. He was going to have to race them for the stuff. He ran towards the things, seized the chicken first and kicked the can off the roof. A Death Eater seized him by the arm and put his wand to his head. Sirius squirted acid at the enemies in front if him and whacked those behind him with the chicken until he was free to slide down the pipe.

On the ground he was immediately pulled inside a dark alley way and shushed by Remus, who could at least walk and talk despite the brief but intense torture experience. James stood against the wall, his finger traps extended across the alley, close to a large, gaping manhole and Peter used his marigold to stop his bleeding.

Then the Death Eaters came down, barged into the alleyway and tripped over the extended fingertraps one by one, and Sirius pushed in those who were wise enough to not go so far. When the final Dark Wizard had fallen James closed the lid and sealed it.

Camera lights flashed outside the alley. That public that was supposed to be indoors applauded, women threw underwear at them and reporters trampled eachother to get their scoop.

There really was no need to become a rockstar after this.


	11. Chapter 11

The Mischief Managers

Chapter 11: Chateau Gateau

Last night's big epic rooftop fight was sure to colour every cloud sunny from now on. Kicking ass, beating a Death Eater majority without wands, it was embarassing, really. And seeing their Arse Mark on the cover of every newspaper, and their group photo covering the special supplement dedicated to them was unbeatable. The boys were so happy silver animals kept shooing out of their pockets, which was a little awkward because of the cheap jokes. Not even Magic Home Economic class could rain on their parade the next day. Magic Home Economics was usually a pretty boring subject. The boys thought of themselves as very modern and progressive, a view that was always challenged when they were asked to sew an apron and the like. It wasn't even fun around Christmas, when they had to make mince pies and fruitcakes and other non-awesome and non-French so-called delicacies, although how anything containing dried fruit could be considered a dessert was a mystery, perhaps the greatest mystery of all. Forget the French Mafia and the wendigos.

But today it was not just tolerable, but in fact very exciting. It almost made the boys forget all about that pesky fame and glory.

"Alright then" said Professor Romsay, who taught the subject. "Although you're all shit, I think you will enjoy today's class because I will teach you how to make the perfect sponge cake, yeah? Now, you all got the recipe so just watch me alright? Making the perfect sponge cake is much like making a perfect Beef Wellington. It must be treated as an art, as well as a science, so I don't want to see sponge cakes that look like a wendigo took a shit, then ate it up, trampled allover it and then used his farts to dry it"

Professor Romsay began to add ingredients to various bowls, put them through various treatments and narrating his actions in the meantime, using many rude words, but not with great variation. Having sifted the dry ingredients he began to whip the eggs and the sugar aggresively.

"Now, when you make a classic lemon genoise" he said. "It is very important to beat the sugar and eggs to the ribbon stage, which you will recognise fom potions class. You will know it is time to fold in the flour when you can do this"

Using the whisk, Professor Romsay lifted a ribbon of batter out of the bowl, flung it around a couple of times as if it was a lasso before he let it drop back into the bowl and put it aside, warning the class about the dangers of overwhipping.

"If you overwhip you will just get a bath sponge" he explained as he poured the dry ingredients into the wet ones. "If you don't whip it enough you will have a sponge bath. Ok, looks done, lovely. Now, the way to fold is to cut across and scrape. Cut across and scrape. Got that? Or your cake will deflate and look like shit arse"

Professor Romsay cut across and scraped a couple of times before he poured the batter in two cake tins and brought them to the oven.

"And no you can't bake them in one tin and then adjust the time and slice it you have to use two this part is crucial"

Having put both cakes in the oven he adjusted the temperature and told the class to get baking and preferably not be so bleeding shite at it.

Although having to make a genoise certainly beat fruitcakes and mince pies James still found it hard to put down the news, and he wasn't just reading articles in the supplement now.

"Here's something that isn't about us! 'Pastry chefs missing from bakery on Quakerstreet'" he read. "'Aurors suspect unannounced honeymoon'" Flip page. "'Ministry official found hanged in closet with several bullets in his head and his mouth stuffed with marbles. Aurors suspect werewolves.'"

"They do like closets and losing their marbles I can't believe the aurors actually know that" said Sirius, already folding, and rather surprising himself at what a natural pro he was at getting rid of those pesky air bubbles.

"'Attorney found in sharktank with his head bitten off. Aurors suspect werewolves.'"

"Now that's spooky. Do you think somebody found my 101 Ways To Make It Look Like Suicide?"

A kitchen timer rang and Professor Romsay put on oven mitts and pulled out the cooling rack with the cakes from the oven and placed them on the counter to cool.

"Always check with a toothpick that it is done"

Within only a few minutes students were already putting their own cakes in ovens, greatly annoying other students that had put their cakes in the oven before them. Once they had been baked and cooled they were allowed to style them anyway they wanted. Most students made stylistically tilting cakes stuffed with buttercream and draped in shrill sugarpaste and gumpaste flowers

"If we put our sponges together we have enough for one medium sized roller skate" said Sirius.

The boys began to cut up their sponges without any real sense of design or direction.

"Maybe we should make a pattern" said Peter when it was too late.

When all the pieces had been assembled and decorated it looked more like contemporary art than cake.

"Don't tell me" said Professor Romsay when he stopped by on his usual round where he told his students their food was shit. "It's modern art? Some sort of feminist statement?"

"It's a roller skate" said Sirius, very puzzled and enormously insulted.

"Oh, I thought those were kni... Anyway, although your cake looks like shit, I like that you're not doing stylistically tilting cakes drenched in sugarpaste and overflowing with buttercream like everybody else. But you really should have used a pattern. With some practice you could bake for the new roller rink"

Professor Romsay laughed at his sarcasm like the prick he was.

"Do they need a cake?" James asked.

"Yes they do. The Quaker Cakery were supposed to make it, but then they went on that unannounced honeymoon. So now Chateau Gateau is making it"

Professor Romsay carried on with his round of insults.

"Well Padfoot" said James. "I don't suppose you know anything about Chateau Gateau?"

"Like what?"

"I don't know. I just figured that since it's French it must be wicked and things that are French and wicked tend to have a connection to you"

"It just so happens I know who the owners are, but that's all"

"Are they wicked?"

"Of course they're wicked. They're in the French Mafia, and we've met some of them. They ground horseheads and use it to stuff eclairs and then put those eclairs in people's beds. You don't look too impressed but now if you ever find an eclair in bed with you, you will know it is really a horses's head and freak out"

"I think I would just frown like I'm doing right now. And long for a regular eclair"

"If you ever wake up next to a horsemeat eclair you won't ever long for regular eclairs ever again"

"Have you ever found a horsemeat eclair in your bed?"

"It wasn't horsemeat. The whiskers were sticking out"

"What did you ever do to upset the French Mafia?"

"It wasn't the mafia. I had made burnt marks on a bunch of paintings"

"Now I'm really sorry to ask if you could find out what the mafia might be up to"

"Sure" said Sirius and left.

"I didn't mean right now!"

But Sirius had already gone and now class was boring.

Little France in Diagon Alley was almost like its own little town, or quiet village. It was full of ordinary sized people, several were of an extraordinary beauty that was just another argument for marrying within family, and they always woke up to say 'bonjour' and were often generous with their books which they gladly handed out for free to anybody pretty enough.

Although it was such a wicked area it didn't flaunt it like the other wicked part of Diagon Alley, on the contrary, it was welcoming, the people were charming and the streets reeked of freshly baked croissants instead of moldy eye of newt. The only complaint the people had was that every morning was the same.

Sirius stopped outside Chateau Gateau and put down the stack of books he had collected on the way without asking for any of them, already sick of this provincial life. Broomsticks swept the floor inside the bakery and he let himself in. A bell rang when the door opened and Rod came out from the kitchen, brushing flour from his apron, and planted on Sirius continental cheek kisses. At least Sirius had been told it was a continental thing, he had just thought only Italians did that. Now he wasn't sure. Maybe it was a mafia thing, but it didn't matter.

"It's Bella's cousin what a wonderful surprise! Mwa mwa! RAB!"  
"WHAT?"

"It's Bella's cousin! I don't think I've seen you since Bella's graduation, when you were just yea high. At least I think it was you. Will you come to the wedding?"

"Yes" said Sirius.

"Splendid!"

Weddings sucked. Being surrounded by wicked relatives always made him question just where on the wickedness scale he really was. Lately he just didn't know.

Rab, the other brother, emerged from the kitchen, covered in ganache stains and planted some unwanted cheek kisses as well.

"What brings us this sudden honour? Are you interested in work experience also? What year are you?"

"That is exactly why I'm here" said Sirius, having nothing else prepared. "I talked to my career's advisor today and realised that, yeah, wicked baking might be just the thing for me"  
"Any time you want to start, all you have to do is show up. As they say, blood is purer than water! Let me feel your hands! Yes, they're very cold, that will serve you well and save on puff pastry freezing time"  
"Great" said Sirius and pocketed his hands. "I just love how you don't do stylistically tilting cakes like Quiche Du Morte next door"

"Tilting cakes, pleh!" spat Rab. "It's a fad, it will pass. Elegance and class will never go out of style. Sugarpaste and buttercream is banned here, might as well tell you now. If somebody says they have an almond allergy you can still say our marzipan is sugarpaste"

"And to vegetarians we say our mousses are made with agar agar!" said Rod and the two shared a wicked laugh. "Anybody who believes mousses can be made with agar agar deserves to die from an allergic shock!"

They had a point, all Sirius knew was that agar was some sort of algae and algae in mousse? Come on, this wasn't a Japanese bakery!

"On second thought" said Sirius, trying to steer the conversation a bit. "I have some alternatives. There was this bakery on Quakerstreet, but the owners just went on a honeymoon all of a sudden. That was a shame, because they do fun novelty cakes"

The brothers turned up their noses and their faces darkened.

"So that's what you're into, huh?" Rod asked. "'Fun novelty cakes'?"

"Get out!" said Rab between clenced teeth and pointed at the door.

"Calm down-"

"They said he was strange and now I believe them!"

"I said calm down! Now, let's sit down over here"

Rod and Sirius sat down at one of the tables.

"I want to give you the benefit of doubt. I mean, so what if you listen to muggle pop and use their wheel-shoes? We all watch telly! And the important thing is that you tried drowning those puppies, right? But then you have to go and bring up 'fun novelty cakes'-"

"I didn't mean it!" said Sirius. "I mean, it was a phase. An extremely, short phase. So you don't do novelty cakes ever, then? That's good to know because I sure hate them"

There were some sketches of roller skates on the table, and as soon as Sirius saw them Rod crumbled them together.

"What was that?" Sirius asked.

"Nothing"  
"It looked like roller skate sketches

"It's going to be my tattoo" said Rab.

They seemed unnecessarily secretive. Sirius could easily ask the people at the roller rink who they were getting their cake from, and suddenly he wondered if they really would get it from a wicked bakery in a wicked district. Of course, most people didn't know the owners of Chateau Gateau to dabble in the wicked culinary arts. It wasn't common knowledge, Sirius just knew because he had learned it at the breakfast table at some point. Furthermore, if they had wicked cake plans they wouldn't want the blame.

"So, you're not baking for the new roller rink, then?" Sirius asked, just to get their official response.

"What new roller rink?"

"The new roller rink in… Hogsmead. Romsay said-"

"We're located in Diagon Alley, why would they ask us? They haven't anyway and novelty cakes is not our niche, I mean, I assume that's what they're after. We've baked for the Wicked Royal Wedding, Wicked Royal Funeral, the most fancy events you know! I mean look at our awards and diplomas and certifications on the wall there!"

There was indeed an impressive collection of awards and diplomas.

"Apparently we're not good enough for the stupid roller rink!" said Rab. "Because we're so far away, I mean"

"And in any case we're way above their price range and not 'novelty fun' enough" Rod added to that.

Then why had Professor Romsay said they were baking for the roller rink? It was all very, very, very mysterious.


	12. Chapter 12

The Mischief Managers

Chapter 12: A Mysterious Letter

Being a superhero and a fulltime wizard student was not as easy as the hit television show Teen Gorgon made it seem. Basil Rattle was a magnet to secret information in a world where everything was a plot device and most of the time it was as if he wasn't a student at Boulderash at all. Like, where were the teachers?

But the boys, they actually had classes to attend during the week and couldn't get out of them as much or as easily as they liked. Besides, homework was beginning to pile up as exam week drew near with the approaching Yule Holiday, although the second most wonderful time of the year was still over a month away.

Two months prior to the big exam week, they already had weekly quizzes and daily assignments and they were so busy they almost forgot entirely that they were superheroes. It started to become a thing of the past, a fading memory, a previous life...

That was until a letter fell in Sirius's wendigo antidote (owls had really stopped caring when and where they delivered their letters ever since the post service had been privatised). He had to fish it out with tweezers and handle it with unicorn baby gloves to not get smelly hands. After reading it first he passed it on to James, who read it out loud:

 _Words travels fast. I don't think you're interested in wicked baking for real. If you had stayed to explore the freezers you would have found the honeymooning bakers from the papers. But then, that's what separates a good finder from a useless finder for you couldn't even find an arc in a rainbow. The bakers have been chopped up and stuck inside plastic bags and I only recognised them because a hand still had flour on it. Just thought it would interest you._

 _Arc in a rainbow,_ James thought that was pretty good.

"That's not like Fletch to be so secretive." he said. "Or brave. And write such nice cursive, that is by far the nicest handwriting I've ever seen, although it makes it a bit hard to read"

The letter inspired questions that were too obvious to be spoken and the boys would have liked to investigate the bakery immediately, but unlike Basil Rattle, they actually had school, and rather surprised them selves at how much they cared.

Evening fell. Teachers and prefects were still patrolling everywhere. Staying indoors all day was so very tedious. The news hadn't reported any crimes of local nature in what felt like ages. Sure, they had received that mysterious letter, but that had been _hours_ ago! It felt like crime would never be comitted again when Professor Romsay poked his head through the kitchen door one tedious evening, looking mighty distressed.

"Oh no it's the French Mafia! If only there was a superhero that could save me!" he pleaded and was pulled back inside the kitchen by ovenmitts with an Eiffel Tower pattern.

"Pfft, superheroes" James snorted, until he remembered. "Wait a minute! _We're_ superheroes!"  
The boys did their synchronized super-turn that they had choreographed to miniscule detail now and their regular after-school wear transformed into their MisMen getup. They barged inside the kitchen, where French Mafia sorciers in venetian masks had their backs turned, forcing Professor Romsay in the oven.

James extended his Chinese finger traps on silent command, seized a sorcier and spun him around until he was so dizzy he fell headfirst on a meat mallet.

"'Oo are yu?" asked the other sorciers, outraged and stereotype-accented.

The boys had to stop and think for they couldn't remember their catchphrase.

"I don't think we had one" said Sirius.

"Of course we did we rehearsed it and everything" said James. "Was it maybe: "Is it a bird? Is it a plane?'"?"

"That's Superman, and it's not even his catchphrase"

"It was: 'Knock, knock'" said Peter.

That didn't really ring a bell either.

"Really?" said James, thinking he would have remembered that.

"I think we just settled for 'Not so fast'" said Sirius, sounding sure.

Another sorcier began to produce a powerful curse. James shielded himself with an ensnared refridgerator.

"Misman Springroll! Watch out for the _Won Ton Weight!"_ he said and dropped the fridge over the sorcier's head. Now there were three of them left and they were all amidst producing the same wicked curse. Sirius whipped out his rubber chicken and spun it fast.

"Misman Chicken-"

"Eggnog"

"Does this _wing_ a bell?" he said and hurled the chicken at another sorcier, who was stabbed to death by a falling knife rack. Sirius looked pretty proud, but James thought it had looked like chance.

Then Remus uncapped his can of not-nuts and let out the bubble gum boas, but not very dynamically.

"Misman Macadamia" he said stiltily. "Here to... mac-a-damage?"

One bubble gum boa bit the fourth sorcier right in the paranuts.

"Is that even gramatically correct?" James asked, and would so liked to have said his clever paranut-catchphrase, and have Sirius bow to him in respect for his catchphrase craftmanship. Remus closed his can.

"Not sorry for not keeping a catchphrase book like you do"

Now there was exactly one sorcier left. Peter did some feeble efforst to squirt milk from his novelty boob apron in his eyes, but he kept missing. Although he was useless and weak, James and Sirius didn't mind another catchphrase-off.

"Hong _Kong!"_ said James, hurling the sorcier into a row of pans, where a boomerang chicken hit him in the head.

"Prepare to get goose _bumps!"_ said Sirius, blowing out the chicken when it had returned to him.

The sorcier had been knocked out twice now and would have just fallen already had James and Sirius not kept crashing him into various furnitures like an excercise dummy.

"I hope you brought your fortune cookie!"

"Peking _duck!"_

When the sorcier fell headfirst in a meatgrinder and the boomerang hit the on-button, the catchphrase-off was over.

"You stole my catchphrase" said James and loosened up his bowtie a bit.

Professor Romsay came out from behind the trash, weeping from gratitude.

"You saved me, mysterious superheroes! How do I ever repay you?"

"Information or money, it's your call" said James.

Professor Romsay turned away.

"I accidentally gave information I wasn't supposed to give, secret information, that's all"

"What information?"

"False information. I mentioned that the bakery Chateau Gateau is baking for the roller rink, but it's false"

"Why would you give false information by accident?" Sirius asked.

"I can't say anymore, or I shall wake up to find a horsemeat eclair in my bed!"  
Professor Romsay stormed out of the kitchen, much distressed.

"I just don't get it" said Sirius.

"It was false, we checked" said James. "The roller rink never considered Chateau Gateau. Tart & Soul is replacing the Hogsmead Cakery"

"But they had roller skate sketches"  
"Chateau Gateau got in touch with the Quaker Bakery" said Remus. "But were refused on account on being too expensive"

There was just too much secrecy involved in it all for it to not be investigated further.


	13. Chapter 13

The Mischief Managers

Chapter 13: The Auror Headquarters

At last the weekend came. Miss. Kensington, who worked alone at the Quaker Bakery today, did not object to answering any questions the boys had, because she thought they were interested in work experience.

"Steve and Jeff went on that honeymoon after work" she explained while sifting powdered sugar onto baking parchment paper instead of directly in a bowl for reasons she had never questioned. "That was pretty unlike them, considering they both have wives. But of course we all know that it would be ignorant to assume that actually proves anything"

"After work" said James. "Why would they have flour on them if they disappeared after work?"

"Did Steve and Jeff do cocaine?" Sirius asked.

"Not that I know of" Miss. Kensington replied. "Why are you so interested in their disappearance? When's your work experience?"

A bell rang and Miss. Kensington brushed powdered sugar from her apron before tending to the costumer in the café, leaving the boys alone in the bakery.

"I bet they were killed over drugs" said Sirius.

"If they had cocaine on their hands don't you think it would have been snorted off?" James asked.

"Good point"  
"Look at this" said Remus, holding a file with recipes. "Cake with human filling"

"So they were killed to be put inside a cake?"

It was strangely reminiscent of the meat pies, and various news reports. But what connection could the Quaker Bakery possibly have to the French Mafia?

"Not initially, I don't think" said Remus, "because look at this. This is the notebook where they note down the orders. This is some weeks prior to the murder: _CG requests HC for 31/10, 16:00._ That's when the roller rink opens, isn't it, on Halloween? The business isn't going well. They were going to do it for the generous pay, decided they couldn't and were killed for having the information. That's my theory anyway, I think something similar happened on Miss. Marble one time"

"So they requested a Halloween Cake, how is that suspicious?" Peter asked, instead of asking why Chateau Gateau would aske the Quaker Bakery to make a cake for the rink.

"I didn't think of that, I just thought it stood for Human Cake" said Remus. "I guess it's just weird then"

"It would be, had it not been for that recipe" said James. "And the little note in the margins, saying: 'I don't think I can do it'. So now they're in the freezer and, judging by the recipe, coated in powdered sugar and not flour. Have they just moved on from horsemeat eclairs or what?"

"They're going to serve it at the rink, and basically turn everybody into cannibals. Do you know what happens to cannibals?"

Something groaned outside, in the distance behind the wind, sounding vaguely like zombies, but with a subtle difference.

"Well now what?" Sirius asked.

"How about-"

"No"

"Come on just this once, pleeeease?"

"That doesn't work on me"

"I will go alone, then"

"Fine, do you want to borrow a pair of unicorn baby gloves?"

It was true that the aurors didn't do much in ways of protecting society, but they would protect their own by all means available, one of them being silver, which warded off most dark things.

"Going to the Auror Headquarters will only be a waste of time" said James.

"But don't you want to at least eat all their donuts?" Remus asked.

Then the boys just realised, they hadn't had any lunch today. And the Auror Headquarters did have the best donuts, and their coffee wasn't bad either. A fire station crackled just across the street from the bakery. From there, Central Diagon Alley was but a tickle in the gut away.

The Auror Headquarters loomed over Diagon Alley Square, across the Court of Diagon Alley and beside the Bank of Gringotts. The large Auror emblem, which bore the image of a ring and a steaming mug, glistened on the marble facade above the door.

The boys entered the building, took the old-timey lift to the third floor where all the offices where, passed through the reception busily, although the receptionist was too busy acting too busy to serve a visitor of ambiguous ethnicity to notice, and had some coffee in the staff room. None of the aurors objected for they were all glued to their new television.

"Ooo, _Spells & Curses" _said James, lingering.

"Reruns?" Sirius asked and gave him coffee in a paper cup.

"Reruns" said James, spoke the lines before the actors for a while until he was shushed. Then he left with his coffee and a box of donuts to find some Chief Inspector.

Chief Inspector Smith had a gold sign on his door, saying "Chief Inspector Smith". The boys decided to show him the file.

"Oi get out!" said Chief Inspector Smith when the boys came into his office.

Oh, poor Chief Inspector Smith, once a celebrated snooping orphan, now a fat, bitter and going through his fourth divorce. It was allover the papers.

"Those honeymooning bakers have been stuffed inside a fridge, Chateau Cateau is serving cannibal cake at the roller rink on Halloween and here is the evidence" said James and put a file on the desk.

"Not my division" said Smith and returned the documents. "Thank you bye"

And so the boys thanked him for his time and showed themselves out.

"Happy now?" James asked.

"No" Remus replied. "Maybe if it wasn't for the prank calls you always make"

"Are you saying-" said Sirius, "that it's a case of boy who-"  
"-called 999 a little too often as _Sourpuss Grape,_ claiming there's a poltergeist in your conk?"

"No that isn't what I was going to say"

"It is what I was saying anyway"

"Why do you act as if you didn't think of _Sourpuss Grape_?"

"Why do you use it when you didn't even think it was any good?"

"It's _so bad_ it's _good"_

"The important thing is we tried to do the correct thing for once" said James. "If they can't let go of the past, tough"

The question now was, as it so often was, what to do now.

"If we offered to make the cake for free" said Peter, for the first time ever having a suggestion with actual potential for consideration, "the rink might choose us"

It was all so unreal it took a while of the other boys to even register anybody had spoken.

"Sorry did you say something?" James asked.

"We'd need a _lot_ of practice" said Remus.

And a lot of equipment, ingredients, enough space and that sketch would be helpful as well. If only there was a place where they had access to all these things, a lot of space as well as privacy.


	14. Chapter 14

The Mischief Managers

Chapter 14: Halloween is coming

Miss. Kensington took Smith's holiday tickets and left the Quaker Bakery completely unsupervised, but just to be safe, a crime scene was arranged as well. Peter lied on his back on the café floor, his head under a chair and a spatula in a pile of ketchup on his chest. The auror forensics were done examining his cavities and removed their disposable gloves.

"Time of death: two years ago" said Lieutenant Cuff. "We better close off the area"

"For how long?" Sirius asked, sniffing in a handkerchief, "For at least a week I hope."

"Until the paperwork has gone through" replied the aurors and told healers to take Peter to the morgue where he'd be dissected for marbles. Two healers placed Peter on a stretcher and carried him out of the café.

"Wait a minute..." said Peter and Sirius put a hot cross bun in his mouth.

"He loved hot cross buns" said James. "And the burial rituals of Ancient Egypt, especially the part about leaving food for the afterlife."

"Looks like there won't be any left for the afterlife" Sirius muttered. Remus stuck a bun with raisins in his mouth. Sirius substituted it for a poppy seed roll.

Peter trembled quite a lot as he was carried out of the café but the healers shrugged it off as an extreme case of rigormortis.

"You better leave, boys." said Cuff. "The area is closed off."  
"Until the paperwork has gone through. Splendid" said James.

The boys went outside the café and watched the aurors leave. Then they crossed the crime scene ribbon and set to work in the kitchen, where they had access to more ingredients and equipment than they could name.

"So how should we make it?" James asked, mixing sugar and flour together. "Should we just bake a cake and then cut out the shape, or should we make a regular cake and stick a sugarpaste roller skate on top?"

"I really want it to be in the shape of a large rollerskate" said Sirius.

"If we had a huge shoe we could make a mold" said Remus, pouring the juice from a bean carton in a stainless steel bowl and added sugar to that. The silly was getting too silly now.

" _What_ are you doing?" Sirius asked, horrified.

"It's aquafaba!"

He sounded so excited, bless him.

"Is that your new bean spell?"

"I'd explain it all, except I don't believe you're really interested"

A shoe mold, that sounded like the alternative that would yeild the best results, provided making a mold was easy.

"Bean spell..." Remus mumbled.

"Are you _really_ considering that now? Where's the versatility? Beans have _one_ form"

"'Where's the versatility'? Have you never heard of Jack and the Bean Stalk?"

Sirius thought he'd see if Tart & Soul had a mold to nick instead of messing down his clothes with flour. He was gone for less than an hour and James and Remus had already turned their failed cakes into cake pop filling when he returned. Shortly after Peter returned, having escaped the intrusive and life threatening treatments at the St. Mungos Mortuary.

As the boys began to stick the filling in the mold, they realised they hadn't even decided what characters to dress up as yet.

"How about characters from Bambi?" Sirius asked, digging a healthy cakepop chunk from a large bucket and pressed it into the mold. "That's Bambi, Thumper and Flower"

Peter looked surprised over not being the appointed skunk in this scenario, while Remus looked offended and had to check his breath.

"Why am I the skunk?" he asked.

"Because he's girly and sleepy that's why"

"What about Wormtail?" James asked.

"Bambi's mum"

"Hey I think Moony wanted to be Thumper"

"I said that if I could choose any fictional character it would be Fiver" said Remus.

"I'm pretty sure he's called Thumper but I haven't actually read the book"

Going as characters from Little Red Riding Hood was, of course, still out.

"I hear Fletch is going as Mr. Badger from the Wind In The Willows again" said Sirius, pressing down some more filling. "I just can't think of any themes that aren't Disney or popular fairy tales"  
"How about we go as our favourite authors?" Remus suggested.

"Only if you go as Mary Shelley"

"She's not my favourite author"

"That's my condition"  
"Zombie Pinocchio, then?" said James. "Pinocchio, Cricket and you and I can be the fox and the cat"

"All in favour?"

But Remus would only go as Pinocchio if Sirius went as the Blue Fairy, which he accepted. They finished stuffing the mold and stuck it in the freezer, where it would need to stay for a couple of hours until it was firm enough for the cling film to be easily peeled off and after that the plan was to crumbcoat it with buttercream and finally cover it with sugarpaste. But all that could wait for another day, for Halloween wasn't until next week. The boys couldn't agree exactly on what day it was, but they knew it was in a few days, which left them more than enough time to do everything last minute, costumes included.


	15. Chapter 15

The Mischief Managers

Chapter 15: A Monster Mash

Halloween came with carved pumpkins on the windowsills and the ghosts were in their best sheets. In spite of Halloween being the greatest of magical days school was still on, and all classes were themed accordingly. At Herbology they carved protective runes on pumpkins and they got to spend Charms class outdoors animating entire pumpkin patches.

When Transfiguration class, during which they had turned pumpkins to helmets, was finally over, the boys thought they were free to unmold the cake and put it together. But they were wrong.

"Where do you think you're going?" McGonagall asked when they passed her desk to leave.

"Hogsmead." James replied.

"Have you forgotten that you hav detention right now?"

Yes he had forgotten that, but she had to understand that keeping track of so much detention was difficult. But fortunately only James and Sirius had detention for something they had done months ago. Remus and Peter were still free from punishment. Or so they thought.

"Well see you." said Remus.

"Not so fast." said McGonagall. "I believe it's your fault my office is packed with chrysanthemums, my tea smells of haggis and a winged baby with an arrow won't leave me alone"

McGonagall waved away a giggling cupid as if it was an irritating bloodsucking disease transmitting insect of some kind.

"No really, I did all that." said Sirius.

"Shut up. Do you really think you're the first to roofie Professor Slughorn as a statement? Well, just because the Roofie Potion isn't against the rules doesn't mean roofying authorities isn't. Now come on."

It looked like only Peter was free now. James told him to just go and finish the cake on his own before McGonagall could dig up some farfetched reason to punish him.

Professor McGonagall led the way to her office, where several boxes of invoices and files sat on the extra table. She conjured some more wheeled chairs and told the boys to get sorting while she sat at the window looking important and busy, but still watchful.

"You know" said Sirius, rolling over to Remus, who was close to nodding off again. "if you acted crazy, that would do the trick for sure"

"Acted crazy how?"

"You know, just generally angry and predatorial"

Several Scottish Folds trotted around the office. One headbutted Remus in the legs. He searched his pockets.

"This is so wrong, what I'm about to do" he said, unwrapped a Twix and threw the cat half of it. The cat gobbled it down like it was chocolate and threw up on Professor McGonagalls green tartan rug shortly after.

"Why would you do that?" Professor McGonagall asked when she saw that Remus had the other Twix half, more suprised than upset.

"I was just feeling angry and predatorial"

Sirius put a hand on his forehead and lit up his eyes with his wand.

"Pupils dilated."

"I better send you to Pomfrey, then." said Professor McGonagall.

"I think you better, for the safety of all of us!"

Although McGonagall suspected tomfoolery of some sort, she was obliged to send him to Pomfrey. But first she had to decide who to supervise. But she needed not scratch her whitening braid for long for then Pomfrey came by to drop off some worm medicine for her cats. When she had run her errand Remus had to follow her to her office in the hospital wing. There she ran the usual tests and made the usual notes.

"You're pupils are a little dilated." she said and put out her wand light. "But that's normal. Professor McGonagall should be around somewhere, she was adamant that you're not let out of sight"

Pomfrey opened her office door. Flu season was high and people sneezed allover as they passed through the hall and in and out of examination rooms and wards. Professor McGonagall was chatting with another healer about an infected arrow wound in the hip. Among other faces of interest was Fletcher, who came out from another ward with bandaid on the hand where an animated pumpkin had bit him in Herbology class earlier today. He had calmed down since then, and was no longer raving about werepumpkins.

"Hey" said Remus. "Do you smell that?"

"That's me" said Fletcher.

"No, I mean, do you smell smoke?"

"That's me"  
"If you're sure. Ever since I heard about invisible fire I've been so paranoid…"

"Invisible fire?"

"Yeah. You can't see it or hear it because it's _so_ fast, so by the time you do notice you're already dead"

"Well that sounds hopeless what can you do?"

"Oh no, it's not at all hopeless. You just have to know the signs. For example, if you see a flock of spiders moving fast in one direction they are probably escaping. Then you must pull the alarm. Sure it might be nothing but I think safety is really important"

Then McGonagall thought they had talked long enough. Remus said see you later to Fletcher and uncapped a valium jar when McGonagall wasn't looking, and poured black widows on the floor.

The alarm rang and water poured down from the ceilings in seconds and panic erupted when Fletcher ran by, screaming about invisible fire.

Somehow McGonagall seemed to know it was a false alarm, but she couldn't be sure and was obliged by rules to never doubt emergencies. Remus wasn't extremely proud of what he had done, but a cake needed delivering and this was the only solution he could think of in such little time.

"The alarm is false" he assured McGonagall and confessed his part in it all, how he had only meant for the alarm to undo all locks.

"I'm obliged to make sure everybody is safe" said McGonagall. "How am I supposed to do that when the other lads have most likely escaped to wherever tickles their fancy better?"

Suddenly Sprout brushed by in much hurry, looking very concerned.

"Your office is on fire, Minerva!"

Remus assured her he'd tell them to call and then he could go because McGonagall wasn't allowed to force him to stay indoors when a fire alarm had gone off.

The cake was finished sometime in the early evening and put inside Fletcher's greenhouse car.

The traffic wasn't too bad, but could have been better still. At this rate they'd get the cake to the rink an hour or so before it opened officially.

And so the boys had the cake, they wore their Mismen get up under their costumes but halfway to the rink they realised they had forgotten their most treasured objects of all: the gadgets.

"Wormtail will get the stuff" said Sirius, who got to drive because he was in such good rock, scissors and paper form today.

"No" said James, who looked more like a brussel sprout than a cricket. "What if McGonagall catches him?"

"Fine Moony will get the stuff he gets away with anything"

"Do not" said Remus in the back. "She had to let me go because of the alarm. I think she blames me for everything"

"I wonder what it's like to _suspect_ McGonagall blames me"

"I'll go with you" said James, already removing his seatbelt under pots of ferns. "Two heads are better than one and also I can gives us a ride back"

"I could go" said Sirius, hitting the break in the middle of the road, much to the chagrin of the growing line of cars behind them.

"Oh, don't be a jellyleg, Padfoot"

"But" and Sirius leaned closer and whispered. "Wormtail and I have _nothing_ in common, we have _nothing_ to talk about! It will be _so boring!"  
_ "Well, maybe it's time to do something about that. Hey, you both like cheese, don't you?"

James adjusted the blue feather in Siriu's hair and got out of the car. It took a while for Remus to get out because he kept getting tangled up in the puppet strings and vines and his nose hit everything. Peter only moved to the front seat because he was asked if he wanted to and was afraid to say no. This car ride was so boring now. There was just no talking to him, and he looked more like a a Chicken O'Nugget than a goldfish.

"Those were some nice gum paste shoelaces" Sirius said, after ransacking his mind for nice which left him physically exhausted. "You have a gift"

But Peter just responded with some bashful selfdeprecating mumbling like some sort of violet which was weird because Sirius had always thought that he had a crush on James.

"How about those election party candidates. Who would you vote for, if you could vote?"

Again Peter just stumbled over his words and trembled. And there was no liquor in the car either.

The remaining journey passed in it was finally over, and Sirius and Peter got out of the car to unload the cake, they were both hit over the head.

"Stupid rivalling bakers!" said Rod while he and Rab loaded both boys inside the trunk. Then they blasted the rival cake to pieces and left to deliver their own.

Visitors were only jus beginning to arrive. Fletcher was among the very first few, dressed in last year's badger suit and scanning the ground for cigarettes.

"Fags, fags, fags..." he mumbled, bent so far down his nose nearly touched the asphalt. "Come on, a butt is all I need! Aha!"

He stopped by a wolksvagen and saw through the window a package of Rothmans sitting in the frontseat like a mirage. And his luck didn't end there, for this was his car! Thieves! He sat down in the car, stuffed his mouth with as many cigarettes as would fit and lit them and and sunk back blissfully among several large cactuses. Then he looked around for lose change and other valuables among all the vegetation, but except for some bubblegum in the backseat he found nothing that could be of any use in any situation.

Then he heard something pounding inside the trunk and he startled and fled the car, thinking it possessed for sure.

"Demon ghouls aaaah!" he screamed as he ran and hid inside a near phone box and began to dial the Hogsmead Exorcists and was put on hold. There, as his nerves calmed down when he heard _The Girl From Ipanema_ , he began to deduce.

"Pink bubble gum... Strange ghoul in impractical location..." He rolled his eyes at his own silly reaction. "I bet it's just one of those harmless but transphobic silly-ghouls!"

He stepped out of the phone box and returned to the car, wand ready.

"Come on, then! Put on your best frock!"  
He opened up the trunk and stepped back. " _Sillius Soddus!"_

Sirius had barely tumbled out of the trunk when his clothes became a pale pink flapper dress with lots of fringes and spaghetti straps. All Fletcher could do was gawp, gawp and question his sexuality again.

"Thank Goat you're here, Fletch" said Sirius, closing the trunk after him and accidentally knocking Peter out a second time in doing so. "Woopsie! Anyway, what time is it?"

"Nearly 8" Fletcher replied.

"I guess it's up to you and me to stop the party. They're serving cannibal cake"  
"Cannibal cake but why?"

"Because they want to turn everybody into wendigos"

"But why?"

"So the Extremist Party can blame immigrants and grow in numbers!"

"Oh"

"Come on, we have to stop them"

The two went inside the rink, where music pumped through speakers while the live band tested the equipment. The first guests were already rolling around and drinking Tizer from paper cups. Refreshments and twiglets had been put out, but the cake was clearly being saved for later.

¨It must be in the kitchen" said Sirius.

"How do you know they are serving cannibal cake?" Fletcher asked. "If you have evidence, which I assume, why don't you just show the staff?"

"Silly, silly Fletch"

"Or, why didn't you call as soon as you found out?"

"Evil people aren't stopped so easily, Fletch! For the record, we told aurors this time"

A member of the staff was going around, asking to see fake ID's. There were some familiar faces here already, among them Cas and Mac. Cas was dressed as a skimpy leprechaun, but at least she had bothered to stick a bolt in her head, and Mac looked like a slug with measles.

"It's the Loch Ness monster" she explained patriotically. "It was this or a skimpy sheep"

"Hey boys!" said Cas. "That dress is so cute I'd love to borrow it sometime!"  
"Maybe you get to just as long as you lay off the cake" Sirius told her.

"Whatever. I know you find me beautiful"

"As long as you lay off the cake"

"I wasn't going to have any cake, but when you try to forbid me, which is just patronising and oppressive, I'm going to have cake anyway just to spite you! I mean, how _dare_ you body shame me? It's blokes like you that cause eating disorders! _"_

"But it's _cannibal cake!"_ said Fletcher.

"Cannibal cake?"

" _Cannibal cake!"  
_ "Have you informed the staff?" Mac asked.

"No what a brilliant idea I think I will do that right now" said Sirius and went to the kitchen, where the evil bakers were attending to a broken cake wheel.

"First aid kits for cakes, how very fascinating!" said a man in novelty horns and a staff t-shirt and when he came out of the kitchen Sirius could see on his nametag that he was Mr. Stevens. He seemed like a good person to warn just to prove to the others how useless that was.

"Mr. Stevens that cake is a cannibal cake it will turn everybody into wendigos here are some documents to prove it"

Sirius gave him the file that inspector Smith had rejected. Mr Stevens looked through it quickly. Then he set it on fire.

"Thank you so much for bringing this to me" he said.

His breath was terrible and his eyes had a reddish tint and he had bumps on his head that were unmistakably the beginnings of wendigo antlers. He couldn't have been infected a very long time ago, and seemed completely unaware of it himself. As he left to tell the staff to close all doors they acted as unbothered as he did by his increasingly more monstrous visage.

The brothers came out from the kitchen, not noticing Sirius who wanted to go to the kitchen and destroy the cake while they were out. But he needed a better and warmer disguise and told Fletcher to come with him to the men's room.

"Let's change costumes" he said and checked his back for a zipper.

"I don't know" said Fletcher, uncertain. "I respect that you have the balls to wear dresses with such confidence but I think the fact that you have the body for it helps"  
"Take it off or I'll break it off"

Fletcher removed the badger head first before unzipping the body. Then he pulled the tight pink dress over his plumpy body with great strain. A few seams even broke. They both helped zip each other up.

"Watch the flesh" said Fletcher.

Oh boy did it reek in the badger costume. Once they had changed their clothes, Sirius left the men's room and went inside the kitchen. The cake, a very delicious looking masterpiece, was spinning slowly on a large lazy susan. Truly, the wonders of sugarpaste knew no limits. Sure, it tasted awful and seemed like an amateur's marzipan...

Anyway, Sirius wasn't a big fan of cake as a rule unless it was puff pastry based so it wasn't difficult for him at all to just pick up a knife and stab it allover and have cake stains fly allover the floor and cupboards. He stabbed and stabbed with great delight until his arm began to cramp and he had to put the knife down. The cake had long since been beyond rescue so he thought he'd just snag a profiterole from tupperware container and be on his way when an entire arm shot from the cake remnants. The arm was so nasty he almost gasped. It was crawling with the most unholy things, no, crawling implied legwork. It was wiggling with the most unholy things.

Another arm shot out and together both arms heaved an entire body out of the cake, so tall the horns ripped through the ceiling as it moved. And the smell, ohhh... That alone was enough to knock a person out. Sirius wished he had something to clog his nose with right now, even bubble gum. The nasty smell rendered him so dizzy he could neither think nor act. The textbooks had warned about the size and strength, but not the smell. And wendigos weren't just fast, but really fast and before he knew it Sirius was dangling upside down, his legs in wendigo grip and his body going down wendigo throat. But at least this was how he had always wanted to die.

Then, just as he was about to be eaten alive, a bubble gum anaconda wrapped itself around the monster's eyes and stuck like glue, making the wendigo so frightened of its own blindness it dropped Sirius and ran out of the kitchen, trying to tear the gum off.

"Ok here's your rubber chicken" said James, handing it over.

"All offence" said Sirius. "You guys _stink!"  
_ "You'll need some of this"

James misted him with a really gross perfume that smelled like sewer times a billion.

"So the wendigos will think you're already dead and leave you alone"

"Won't they sense my… life essence?"

"No. Open up"

James forced Sirius's mouth open to defile its interior. Then he went to put away his broomstick.

"Are you misted, too?" Sirius asked Remus.

Remus cracked. " _No!"  
_ Sirius took the mister and gave Remus a very generous misting.

"Where's your blue dress?" James asked

"Uhm... Where indeed"

It had become a pink dress and now Fletcher was wearing it. But Fletcher couldn't have gone far. When Sirius opened the kitchen door, Fletcher actually came running inside.

"Close the door close the door!" he cried.

"I want my dress back" said Sirius.

"Ok I want by badger costume back"

Great, then they could just undress again and switch costumes a second time.

Pandemonium called and all the boys, except for Fletcher who wanted to investigate the chimney, left the kitchen. Outside chaos did a good job spreading. Visitors transformed less than gradually into wendigos allover and grew in size with each consumed human and there seemed to be no defeating them. The usual go-to spells did nothing and death was followed by undeath at a quick rate. It was all very distressing. It was as if they were controlled by something external, but just what?

The worst part was that there was no exit. All doors and windows were locked and unsmashable and casting fruitless spell after fruitless spell started to become exhausting and wear down the magic level. This wasn't a good time to be too prideful to hide somewhere for a minute.

"Look behind us!" said Peter, pointing at a pack of wendigos swarming over the rink, trampling as of yet non-turned visitors in its path as they tried to roller skate for their survival.

"So do something don't just stand there screaming" said James, for his fingertraps had gotten stuck in his roller skates so everytime he rolled he fell over.

So, deeply uncomfortable, Peter squeezed his fake novelty bosoms, squirting milk at the wendigos and annoying them extremely little and angering them even more. But the diversion helped James unstick himsenf and the boys rolled from the rink, through a hall and inside the staff room, which both thankfully and amazingly was empty. Here they could catch their breath and think.

"Come on think those wicked sorciers must be somewhere" said James.

"They are probably outside that would be the smart thing to do" said Sirius.

"Damn you're right. Must be some way…"

"I got it! if we killed someone he'd come back as a ghost and then he could get help"

"Ok that's plan C"

"How about one of you just contact McGonagall?" said Remus.

"Ok that's plan E"

"Well it looks like we're just left with plan B" said Sirius.

"But you said no bubble gum not now not ever" said Remus.

"If I told you to fall off a bridge-"

"Bicker bicker bicker!"

"You know if your bubble gum is useless just say it so we can move on"

"Bubble gum just saved your life show some respect!"

They really wanted to set up some sort of trap. The problem was they were completely void of ideas.

"Well this sucks" said James. "Why are we hiding in here like chickens this is not what superheroes do it's like we just forgot what it means"

"The door's right there good luck"said Sirius and sat down on the sofa.

Although they were misted and reeked of death, if they behaved 'too much like living' the wendigos were going to notice sooner or later, especially if they ran around and emitted a lot of warmth and magic. But hanging around here was useless and boring and they had regained some magic power now, so they gave themselves a second misting of Eau du Morte before leaving the room to try and locate the source of the wendigo control.

In the roller rink hall the live band had long since eaten eachother and green limbs twitched in piles of undead bodies. It was extremely fortunate that nobody from Hogwarts were in those piles, a miracle actually.

"Or maybe it's The Conk!" said Peter, in awe, trying to connect that subplot with the main plot, but in vain for that was not going to happen. "I've actually figured out who it is!"

Who cared, 'though, when wendigos were on the lose? If The Conk wanted to be found out he could just come out and introduce himself already and stop fooling around and be such a show off.

The few that were still alive were playing dead and wet from smelly wendigo dribble, which helped them in their performance. All the while the sorciers seemed to have left the building, or so the boys thought, when they heard the distressed call of a woman.

" _Help! Help!"_

They shifted into their bowties and formal shorts on instinct.

"Someone's been kidnapped!" said James and turned.

"You know it is obiously a trap" said Remus, eternal critic. Some people, they just saw flaws in eeeverything.

"Of course it's a trap but we have to save her!"

"No I mean that is so obviously a tape recorder"

"Oh yeah how can you be sure?"

"Because it was quiet and just sort of crackling for a while and now it's playing 'Monster Mash' _"_

It was true. Listening they heard the tape being stopped, rewound and then the woman started screaming again.

"A tape recorder doesn't disprove that a person has been kidnapped" said James. "I mean, why is a tape with a screaming woman playing all of a sudden, they are wicked enough to kidnap a real one"

"Clearly not"

"So you propose inaction because you think evidence is insufficient, huh?"

"What evidence?"

"Padfoot will settle this do you think we should investigate or hang around like chickens?"

"Fuck chickens God this is boring why do I feel so irritated?" Sirius said, already following the tape.

The sound led them to a storage room, a dusty and suffocating storage room full of shelves and boxes. Here they saw that the tape was nothing more than a tape. There was no distressed damsel transformed to a tape and then tied to a chair, just a tape recorder with a tape marked 'Halloween Songs'.

Suddenly the boys found that they were being disarmed on their gadgets from behind.

"Well well well" came a voice from behind. "How nice to see you"

The boys turned, suspecting those sorciers, wanting it to be those sorciers and lo, it was the sorciers from the druid house. And the sorcier with the red venetian mask wore a ring, the ring from the Museum of Relics, and it glowed in the faint light. He held it aloft and used it to summon every wendigo in the building. Each of them arose from the ground, all at once, and just stood around waiting for the ring wearer to give his orders.

"Looks like you're done for" he said. "We aren't done until everybody in the building is dead and while you're here playing superheroes that isn't going to happen as quickly as we'd like"

"Us what about The Conk?" James asked, just out of curiosity.

"The what?"

"The other superhero that's been running around here keeping people from undying"

The sorcier turned to his partner. "Do you know of any other superhero?" he asked.

"No never heard of it" his blue-masked partner replied.

Perhaps that was what The Conk was going for, to do good and not be noticed. Sure, it was the ultimate protection and he could tell himself it was noble and selfless, but it took that superhero edge off, it was only a very cowardly superhero that didn't want the unwanted attention.

"But he knocked you out in that druid kitchen" Sirius only just recalled.

"That was The Conk?"

"Who did you think it was?"

The sorciers clenched fists. "That elusive _Halfblood Prince!"  
_ "Who?"

"We've sought after him, thinking he had some connection to royal horses, but... our searches have yeilded nil... Anyway, it doesn't really matter. You've been celebrated in the press, your are currently the greatest superheroes in the eyes of the public, therefore it will be very wicked of us to kill you all now. Very wicked indeed. Anyway, I think we've stalled well over the required minimum now. Shame to do this on a Thursday. We're such good pagans, generally. And on a fullmoon, too..."

The sorcier with the ring flicked it and the wendigos set off. The boys ran as fast as they could further down the storage room which appeared to be as long as it was narrow. They were beginning to shake off those wendigos and even saw a smaller window where a curtain fluttered, and a large badger head on the floor below it, when Remus just stumbled and fell from sheer exhaustion. This was unusual, because running was actually one of his few strong points when it came to physical activity, precisely because of situations like this. And now the wendigos were closing in again.

"Silly soricer!" said James, glancing at the window that was ever so close and open. "It's not fullmoon today! Snape said so yesterday!"

"I know" Sirius replied. "And I sure could go for some more Wendigo Antidote, that stuff tasted great!"

"Must have been that sprig of rosemary"

"They must have gotten the day wrong it happens to us all"

A strong light beamed through the window and the boys looked up to find that it really was fullmoon. Well, that just had to be fake or something because Snape really had said that today wasn't fullmoon, and that he really had had the best intentions adding his mysterious liquid to their wendigo antidote. And come on, Snape wouldn't lie!


	16. Chapter 16

The Mischief Managers

Chapter 16: A Double Funerals

Listening to people bragging about who got the most treats or who toilet papered the biggest mansion was tedious. At least the boys seemed to have their magic back. That was the last time they'd ever rely on an immunity potion.

"Pfft, amateurs" said James, enjoying popcorn for breakfast. After last night's acute lack of popcorn when it had been so very appropriate, he had taken it upon himself to fashion his own popcorn magic. Popcorn, what couldn't it do? You could stick it in orifices, and it floated... The important thing wasn't what it couldn't do or that it wasn't as useful as bubble gum, because nothing could ever be, no the important thing was that it was what the people wanted. People wanted popcorn, not bubble gum!

Roy passed by, engaged in conversation with Phil. Sirius held him back.

"Hey guess what we did last night" he said.

Roy rolled his eyes in his usual twitful fashion.

"Oh, let me guess! You put makeup on a werewolf, or braided one's hair, or dressed one up as Olivia Newton John!"

Well, Sirius could roll his eyes twitfully, too.

"No, we didn't do anything _ordinary!"_

"Maybe if you tried a little harder to make your blatant lies believable instead of just exagrerrating a dull night in, sweetie, then maybe _sombody_ would be impressed!"

What a twat! Roy turned back to Phil and continued to brag about the size of the house he had tooth flossed.

"And it was all in one long string!"

Sirius grabbed a fist of popcorn from James's plate.

"Goat people are lame"

"The important thing is that we know that we made the papers" said James, reading the morning news. "Listen to this. 'Halloween party turned to hell on Earth last night when wendigos were let lose at the Hogsmead Roller Rink. The wicked French Mafia, Tojours Fromage, would surely have succeded in turning everybody into wendigo slaves for their wicked French overlord had not the Mismen intervened and stopped them. Their only regret, says the superheroes, is that they couldn't stop the sorciers from comitting suicide by sticking steak knives in a fan. The aurors want to run some tests on the suicide note, not entirely convinced a demon barber isn't on the lose again.'

Breakfast hour was nearly over when Remus showed up, looking ever so chirpy and energised and looking really well in spite of last night's intense events. But when he found he was being stared at, he turned significantly less chirpy.

"Why are you staring you're making me nervous" he said.

Nothing! _"_ said Sirius and began to destroy every newspaper in sight.

"Anything in the papers about last night?"

"Nope and that's makes us so angry we want to destroy them all" said James, ripping a bunch to shreds. "Stupid crap paper!"

When they had destroyed every paper in sight things became a little quiet while James and Sirius tried to think of a new subject of conversation so last night's Blue Moon and related blood bath would never be spoken again.

"I can't remember anything from last night" said Remus.

"Nothing?"

"Just passing out in the storage room and then just waking up and feeling great"

"That's nice tonight is when you go dance on people's graves, right?" said Sirius. "I have a few on my list"

"Cool what music will you play?" James asked.

"Doctor's Orders"

" _Seriously?"_

"Yeah seriously! Love's the best physician, Prongs. Not that any of us need one since we're so sane and not crazy mad"

"So what happened last night?" Remus asked, still on that old boring subject.

"The aurors showed up, brought us all to safety and dealt with the situation very profesionally, ok?"

"Really?"

"...Yeah! They had probably been drinking or something"

"Wait a minute... Aurors? Showing up? Dealing with the situation? Profesionally?"

"Like I said, they must have been under some influence"

"And also, by aurors he meant Dumbledore" said James. "Dumbledore showed up and took care of everything himself"

"Ok now I know you're lying, Dumbledore never takes care of anything himself!"

"Seriously learn to listen he said McGonagall" said Sirius.

"Ok fine if that's how it's going to be. Here's a paper you forgot" said Remus and asked Fletcher when he passed by if he could borrow his newspaper. Fletcher handed it over as if it was cursed.

"The news were pretty scary today!" he said. "What happened to those chefs was _brutal!"_

"What happened to those chefs?"

"They stuck steak knives in a fan and put it on high speed! They explained their method in great detail in their suicide letter as well as their tragic motifs, but I'm not entirely convinced. I mean, everybody were so excited about Halloween this year because they thought the Blue Moon would add spookiness, and it sure did!"

Then Fletcher ran off to class. Remus was just about to open the news when James took it from him.

"Alright we'll tell you, the full and honest version" he said. "Padfoot?"

"They were depressed" said Sirius. "They had just been diagnosed with an almond allergy"

This could clearly go on forever.

"Are you withholding information because you think the truth will make me freak out?" Remus asked.

"Yes"

He couldn't deny that was fair. Why couldn't he ever focus on the epic side of things and rejoice having single handedly shredded twentysomething wendigos and make them a firework of undead tissue. Making a rabbit jump though a hoop just didn't compare. But sure, when things of such awesome nature happened it had nothing to do with him, but when less pleasant things happened it was all his fault.

"Did I kill those bakers?"

Case in point.

"Hm no don't think so..." said Sirius.

"Don't remember seeing you there..." said James.

Remus needed to up the bubble gum dose.

"You _know_ what I mean"

"Not really"

"What _do_ you mean?" Sirius asked.

"Only that I'm going to have to hand myself over to the aurors"

"Now look" said Sirius. "The important thing is that those chefs got what they deserved and that the homeless vegan beggars _can_ be choosers. Do you really deserve to be punished for that?"

"I guess not"

It was all so weird. Last night the boys had been so sure there wouldn't be a fullmoon, because Snape had said so. Today they could plainly see in their calendars how they had been lied too, but just how come they had believed Snape over their calendars?

"For you see..." came a nasal voice and the boys turned. Lo, it was Snape, and he had an exposition for them by the sound of it.

"Did you have a good Halloween last night?" he asked, instead of explaining anything, like the boys had thought, and stroked a tiny vial with what looked like pee.

"Ha ha for it was I!" he cried, and was buried in a hill of popcorn.

The boys finished their breakfast, attended their classes. When the day was done Sirius wanted to find himself a boombox and then go to Saint Leviathan's Cathedral in Hellgravia, Diagon Alley, and play some loud music on the grave of his recently executed gran.

There were a few people out visiting their dear wicked ones on this day, bringing ritual candles to their graves so they could summon lesser demons and tell them to not be too gentle with the whip.

Only very posh people were buried here. Most of them had large marble tombstones with golden writing, but nobility had their own mausoleums.

Vindemiatrix Capella Noir, however, had a small wooden cross made from dry sticks commemorating her.

All because of one hairbrush.

A double funeral was being held by a in the grieving crowd had raven hair, save for one or two blondes, and two or three of some other unnatural colour.

"Ding dong" said a Luciferian druid solemnly, while women wept and men looked bored. "Wicked in life, so shall they be wicked in hell. Ding dong the wicked witch is dead"

"Ding dong" said the grieving.

James wondered why Sirius didn't push the play button on the boombox already.

"Well enough of that" said Sirius and pushed the play button at last, shimmied to Doctor's Orders just because it was the tradition he had been brought up with, and then he was ready to leave.

"Who do you suppose they are?" James asked, referring to the funeral.

"Must be those sorciers from last night..."

"OH NO WHY NO!" a woman in a black dress and black veil wailed in the distance. Then when she saw Sirius she smiled and waved.

"That was quick" James thought. "A funeral for them already?"

"For the heirs to get their share of the will a funeral ceremony must be held for the testator"

"So...?"

"Exactly"

"But...?"

"All the time!"

The coffins were thrown in their graves, piles of soil shovelled over both and then the funeral guests wanted gin and tonic with their zucchinis. They spoke mostly French, something James didn't do, but it wasn't difficult to guess the meaning of 'gin and tonic' and 'voulez vous courgette avec moi?'. When they had gone and the cemetery was momentarily empty, the boys went to inspect the new graves up close.

"What happened to the bodies?" Remus asked. "I mean, what conditions were they in?"

"I haven't watched a movie in _ages!"_ said Sirius.

"I hear reactions are mixed to Blazing Saddles _"_ said James. "But it will be a cult classic one day, I'm sure!"

"Why have you seen it?"

"No but that Mel Brooks is a hoot!"

"What is this just answer the question!" said Remus, getting so irritated now.

"They got away isn't it wonderful?" said Sirius.

"Who, then, were just buried?"

"Sacrificial mudbloods? Bags of cabbages? I don't know everything!"

But of course, Remus could always tell when information was being withheld.

"Everybody thinks they were shredded, but they weren't actually shredded. So they are hiding somewhere, patching themselves up, and nobody is looking for them. Or altenatively they went to get cured at the Hellgravia Necromantic Hospital, since they actually provide that service. Well, it just seems pointless to me to make a popcorn spell and then _not_ go and see a movie"

"Stop dragging, then!" James replied.

They turned their backs on the graves and went to the gates, from where the nearest cinema was but a street fire station away. After last night's intense events and tragic loss of gadgets it was a good idea to put those formal shorts on the shelf for a while. Besides, the Mischief Mangers were too famous now. If they were ever to continue with their heroic deeds one day, they needed to be renewed to keep people guessing, yet hold on to that which made them unique at the same time.

Fin


End file.
